


Stories Of A Memorable Youth (Year Two)

by odinswhiteraven



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling, The 100 (TV)
Genre: Action/Adventure, Alternate Universe - Harry Potter Setting, Alternate Universe - Hogwarts, Alternate Universe - The 100 (TV) Fusion, Angst, Bullying, Childhood Friends, Childhood Memories, Crossovers & Fandom Fusions, Drama, Emotional/Psychological Abuse, Enemies, F/F, F/M, Family, Fluff, Friendship, Hurt/Comfort, M/M, Psychological Trauma, Slow Burn
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-04-20
Updated: 2019-11-10
Packaged: 2020-01-22 21:00:57
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death
Chapters: 5
Words: 50,097
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18535402
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/odinswhiteraven/pseuds/odinswhiteraven
Summary: Second part in a coming of age tale that will span the seven years it takes to graduate Hogwarts.Bellamy Blake and Clarke Griffin continue to navigate their separate journeys throughout Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry during the summer before their second year and the spring that follows. Battle lines have been drawn, sides chosen, friendships forged, enmities spawned, and now a dueling tournament approaches their magical school. Wherein the student body will divide into partners and have the opportunity to defend themselves while disarming others. Untold glory awaits the victors of this competition. Alliances will be made, rules broken, and one specific conflict threatens to shatter the peace that has stood strong throughout Hogwarts's proud, recent history. Let the games begin again.Disclaimer: Relationships and friendships will VASTLY differ from canon. There will be cameos and mentions from the HP fandom. Major and minor characters from the 100 will be there. I neither own the 100 nor Harry Potter franchises. This is a work of fanfiction. The works this is based off of belong to Kass Morgan, the producers at the CW, and JK Rowling. I also do not own the chapter songs that are advertised.





	1. Two Fronts

**Author's Note:**

> A beast stirs in the north. 
> 
> "Seven Devils" by Florence + The Machine

From up high the bonfire was a lone shard of radiant glass flickering upon the dusk covered beach. It crackled, hissed, and popped like the skin of a pig being roasted, only there was no pork to be found on a spit. Bryan Station, the twelve-year old boy charged with maintaining its flames, stood up from his chair and fed it some more fuel. Ember shrouds burst forward with every wooden log.

“What the hell did I get myself into?” The boy grumbled. He checked his watch. “Dragon’s dung."

Bryan looked achingly towards the beach house in the distance, where the rest of his friends relaxed within its shiplap walls. Jealousy bubbled up inside of him at the sight of its many glowing windows. No doubt it was warmer inside there than it was out here.

The ocean waves gave off an icy chill and its foaming waters, underneath the dwindling horizon, were an oily black.

It was colder than any evening they’ve had so far this summer.

“What’s taking them?” Bryan chucked a couple wooden chunks into the blaze before sitting back down. “They’re running late.” He tightened his windbreaker and scanned his watch again.

A beastly rumble erupted from deep inside his belly.

The last time he was inside the beach house there was talk amongst the boys about frying up some Lancashire sausages and turning them into sandwiches with butter-spread rolls, wedges of Wensleydale cheese and hot sauce.

He salivated just at the thought of sinking his teeth into one of those beauties. The prospect of doing that when he was finished with all this made the unpleasant task a bit easier to endure.

“Bloody hell.” Bryan muttered. He gritted his teeth and kicked around sand. “Of all the floating assignments I could’ve taken, it would be on a lousy night like tonight.” The boy was tempted to leave.

Tempted to let this stupid fire die out and wither into ashes.

And in another life, he might’ve.

But not in this one.

Bryan knew what would happen to him if he abandoned his post. He’d never hear the end of it.

Because once you’ve been picked for a job, there was no discussion afterward. It was what his pals held onto ever since they started at Hogwarts. It was your duty to carry out what was asked of you.

If you refused or turned tail, you were a cowardly, wet shit and being called that, to him, was worse than being called any other curse out there.

Except Mudblood. There was nothing lower than such putrid filth.

He didn’t want to lose favor with his friends. The boy couldn’t bear to be ostracized.

To be the odd one out. Not again. He’d already experienced enough of that.

Life at school, for him at least, would become hell again if that happened.

And the possibility of bearing all that suffering again was more than he could stomach in one sitting.

Out of all things, Bryan always held onto one: loyalty. Loyalty meant something in this world. It meant everything to him. This crappy task was just another testament to that fact. Just another test.

“I hope I’m back in time for the game.” He mumbled. “Supposed to be one for the ages.”

It was the Quidditch World Cup after all.

And such a spectacularly epic event only happened every four years. They no longer lived in the Dark Ages of old, where you had to physically be there just to see it. Over the years the Wizarding World had made strides in combining the complexity of their magic with the many technological developments of Muggle life. The two spheres of influence blended. Wizards and witches were now able to view any Quidditch match being played around the world on various projector screens.

This match was no exception, especially since it was destined to capture worldwide attentions.

England vs. Germany.

For the first time in decades, they were in the Final.

Had they been raised as Muggles; they would’ve probably named this upcoming match-up World War III.

But they’d all been raised better than that.

In this case, Great Britain was the underdog. Pitted against an offensive and defensive juggernaut that had steamrolled over the other countries they faced so far throughout the whole competition.

Bryan wasn’t a fan of gambling and he detested the nature of betting even more.

But for some odd reason, he found himself placing five Galleons on Germany’s victory. It was all the money he had in the world and he had no problem making the wager with his friends, who jokingly called him a traitor to both queen and country.

It was a farce. Nobody cared for the Muggle woman in charge of the other Muggles in England. If they’d replaced her with Minister of Magic, Hermione Granger, that’d be a much, much better fit.

Whatever the case may be, Germany was indeed an engine of destruction, akin to that of the Muggle war term ‘blitzkrieg.’ There was no way Great Britain stood even the slightest of chances.

Even so, he had an advantage. His bet had one specific stipulation: Germany would most definitely win the match, but England would be the one to catch the Golden Snitch first.

That last part was the important part.

Because there was still hope for their country yet.

Their homeland’s current roster contained the greatest Seeker to have ever flown above their isles. Never had there lived such a terror of the skies, not since the likes of the legendary Viktor Krum.

Eliza Morley.

The Red Sparrow. Scourge of the clouds. A pure and utter zephyr incarnate.

England’s sword against the coming tide of red, yellow, and black. She’d never lost a Seeker duel. Ever since the start of her stellar career, no one’s managed to snag the Golden Snitch from under her.

Win or lose. Eliza always held the glittering ball of gold in the end.

That much was true at least.

“We are going to lose.” Bryan whispered. “But she’ll out fly all of those sauerkraut eating floats.”

It was shaping up to be quite the showdown and he was keen to witness it in all its glory with all the friends he’d left back at the beach house. If only that time came around sooner rather than later.

The wind began to howl around him.

Bryan felt its bite deep down in his bones. He fastened on an additional cloak over his shoulders, one he kept hidden away for emergencies, and hunkered down in his chair. The boy looked upward towards the full moon and the stars only now beginning to shine through curtains of wispy clouds.

The boy missed Hogwarts.

Home was good. Seeing both of his parents again even better. But nothing compared to the stone-carved castle walls of their magical school. Nothing triumphed against the paintings that talked back, the many sassy ghosts who offered advice or directions, and the enchanted moving staircases.

Not to mention all the many delicious foods prepared for them day in and day out. Breakfast. Lunch. Dinner. It was like everything had been specifically designed to make you come back for seconds.

But most of all, he missed the magic. Bryan missed learning new, spectacular ways of bending the world’s laws to his will with the flick of a wand. Never mind the ink-blotted fingers after writing essay after essay with a quill, exploding flasks and ruptured cauldrons deep in the Potions dungeon.

The boy couldn’t wait for summer to be over. Couldn’t wait to see how the Great Lake looked at night thanks to the lanterns hanging at the front of their rowboats. The shiny and slimy tentacles of the Giant Squid guiding them on their way across.

Bryan knew more than anyone that it would be a second-year to remember. One they’d never forget.

Something snapped.

A loud, hollow echo of a break. Like the branch of a tree or the fragile bones of some slaughtered rodent. It struck him right out of his nostalgia because there were no trees for miles on this beach.

Save for the logs he brought himself.

At first, he thought it was the firewood pile next to him, but every single piece of cut up tree looked to be stationary and all but silent.

Another snap followed. And then another. Again, and again. Bryan stood up from his chair because he’d finally realized what’d been doing all the noise-making. It was the fire. The fire was snapping.

It was rising as well.

Like an overgrown nest of fiery serpents moving relentlessly side to side. It grew wilder and wilder with every disjointed splintering sound. It rose and fell and rose again just like the riptide waves vomited by the pitch-black ocean in front of him.

The beast of a bonfire roared as well.

With every billowing swell, Bryan retreated further and further away from the heat and covered his ears. But it did nothing to stop all the chaotic sounds from invading the inside of his head.

And then the color of the flames began to change.

From an orange and yellowish gloom to a blood-spattered crimson hue before it evolved into the glimmering greenish gleam of a snake’s scaly skin.

The boy realized what it all meant now that he returned to his senses.

That green wasn’t reptilian.

It was a Floo Powder green.

Which meant they were finally coming.

The ones he’d been so unhappily waiting for.

Bryan squinted at how blindingly bright the emerald flames were now becoming.

And like the flash of lightning that preceded the deafening herald of thunder, the bonfire exploded.

He heard the cracking of a whip and then something hard wrapped itself around his neck like a noose and pulled him forward onto the earth. The boy felt the gritty sand enter his nose and mouth.

Whoever did that had now planted a boot heel in the back of his neck and menacingly pressed down. Bryan choked out a plea, but he didn’t think they heard. He tried grabbing for his own wand.

But it was missing.

Strange, the boy could’ve sworn it was in his windbreaker just a second ago. A narrow piece of blackthorn, hidden away in his inner pocket. Close to his chest. Near his heart. Where had it gone?

Shadowy figures emerged from the embers that the now dying bonfire sputtered with arms outstretched and the faint, thin outlines of wands could be made, pointing out from all their hands.

“I’ve got one!” The first voice called out. It sounded commanding. “Fan out!”

Quick and quiet movements could be heard as the silhouettes branched off to comb the surrounding area.

“Check our flanks!” A second voice had rung. “We don’t want any surprises!”

“Clear!” A third announced.

“Nothing on my end.” A fourth resonated.

“Everything’s okay!” A fifth concluded.

Then all the voices began to blend with one another, into a single mass of constant dialogue.

“What a lousy beach.”

“Seashells and spindrift as far as I can tell.”

“All I see is the one chair.”

“They left that fool alone.”

“A single scout?”

“A costly mistake.”

“What sort of idiots are we dealing with?”

“The kind who won’t know what hit them.”

It just occurred to Bryan, at that very moment, that all these voices belonged to girls. But they weren’t like any girls he’d heard of before. No, these girls. They were a different brood of trouble.

“Please let me go.” He was surprised to hear a sixth girl. “I did what you asked.” The way this one made its presence known, hunched over and kneeling in the sand, was pathetic. No wonder he couldn’t see her. Why she was with the other five was beyond Bryan’s guess. “Just don’t hurt me.”

“Echo.” The first voice ordered. It had a cold, unforgiving tone. Like the venomous bite of a snake.

One of the shadows moved back inward, towards the groveling figure and leveled its face with a savage heel kick. The ‘thud’ reverberated from where Bryan lay. He could feel her pain from where he was.

“On your feet, Costia.” It belonged to their boss, the boy knew that now, the voice of the girl whose boot currently pinned down his neck. “Stand up.” She had a quiet fury about her ways. “Right now.”

The weasel-like girl continued to cry, refusing to obey the command.

“I won’t ask you again.”

“Lexa…” The girl named Costia had pleaded. “…please help me.” She sniveled: “Don’t let her-”

“Hit her until she finds her feet.” Their leader’s command had cut through the night like a knife.

A series of footfalls followed. Each one louder than the last, full of such force that it dusted up the sand. Only in between each one, cries of pain were being tucked away. The girl named Costia was being kicked. Again, and again and again. The girl whose name was Echo took her job seriously and the shadowy girls gathered around her to watch the vicious assault like blood sport spectators.

Echo let out these animalistic noises with every blow she landed on her victim. She seemed to delight in the violence because they began to sound even more unhinged with every sadistic thump.

Costia was screaming out her anguish now. Her shrieks for mercy grew louder and louder. She screeched for help from all of them, enunciating the word ‘please’ over and over until it became clear to Bryan that no one on this beach wanted to help. Costia’s suffering became a redundancy.

It all sounded so terrifying. The constant wailing of terror. The horrible, unrelenting beating. The other girls around her, silently watching it all happen to her. It was all too much for Bryan to bear.

“STOP IT!” The boy managed to shout from the chokehold the girls’ leader’s boot had on him. “STOP HURTING HER!”

The kicking stopped. The shadowy girls turned to him next. The rough boot on him pressed harder.

So, Bryan closed his eyes and prepared for the worst.

A long silence followed his outburst.

And then a command.

“Light.”

Four voices sounded “Incendio” at once and the firewood pile next to where the bonfire used to be caught on fire immediately. Its sudden light revealed the Slytherin girls he heard so much about, notorious for their iron reign of terror. Their infamy struck fear in every single one of the hundred.

And the hundred was them. Their generation. Newcomers to Hogwarts about to start second year.

He looked up at the one who led them, the blonde-haired tempest of girl had him under her boot.

“Brell.” Clarke Griffin called out to one of the members of her entourage. “Would you be so kind?”

A coal-haired girl marched forward and, when Clarke retracted her boot heel from his neck, replaced the pressure hold with her own. And when Griffin went to face him, Bryan grew cold all over. She had blue eyes like chipped ice shards, her blonde hair twisted into an exotic knot. Clarke Griffin looked both beautiful and brutal all at one time. The girl began glaring at him dangerously.

“Nilyah.” The Slytherin girl tossed something over to her fellow blonde on the right, only this girl’s hair color was much dirtier. “What can you tell us?”

It dawned on Bryan that the thing thrown was a wand.

His wand.

When had she taken it from him? He barely had a chance to register their arrival. How did she-

“Blackthorn.” Nilyah caught the wand effortlessly and ran it along the underside of her nose, her nostrils flared as she took in its scent. “Made from a shrub in the Andes.” She smelled it so deeply.

“Is he the one?” Clarke asked.

“He’s the one.” Nilyah stated.

The blonde-haired girl moved closer to Bryan, he flinched as her boot heel came close to his face. The boy was expecting a broken nose any minute now. She seemed like the type to do it. When she knelt in front of him, he breathed a sigh of relief. But then she got that look on her face again.

“You’re a brave one.” Clarke purred. “Talking out of turn like that.”

He didn’t answer instantly. There didn’t seem to be any right thing, in his opinion, to say to her.

“I hate bravery.” She whispered angrily to him. “It’s just another word for ‘stupid’.”

“Leave her alone.” Bryan responded quietly. “She’s had enough.”

“Are you giving me an order?” The Slytherin gang leader pulled out her own wand, a black, jagged piece of weeping willow wood. She pressed the tip into the corner of his eye. Bryan shut his eyes tight and then whimpered as she pushed it deeper inward. “I don’t think you’re in any position to.”

“Don’t-”

“Have you got something to say?”

“Please-”

“Be careful.” Clarke Griffin hissed vehemently. “You don’t want to say the wrong thing.”

“Clarke.” One of the girls in her group moved forward. This voice Bryan knew. She was the most reasonable one there. His orders were to stick by Lexa Northwood at all cost. “We’re low on time.”

Her wand’s point left his eye and the boy opened both to see a furious Clarke glowering at Lexa.

“She’s right.” The group’s last enforcer, Echo Azgeda, uttered. She stood over a trembling Costia Hetoph, battered and bloody. The poor girl had dark bruises on her arms from the beating given to her. “We have control of the fireplace. But it won’t be long before her mum comes by to check on everything.” Echo stepped over her prey. “Dakavia won’t be able to hold Ontari hostage for long.”

“The others are with her.” Clarke dictated. “And so long as we hold the other spare of the pair-”

“But her mum’s interference could ruin everything you’ve been working toward.” Brell had added.

“You told us that the sleepover was merely a cover.” Nilyah mentioned. “Covers can be blown.”

“All the more reason to move forward.” Lexa had chimed in. “You’ve got a rendezvous to make.”

It seemed all four girls were in collusion; Bryan hadn’t missed the disturbed glances traded with one another. Even Echo, the girl who seemed to revel in cruelty the most, looked concerned for her commander. She accepted her role in all the violence. But she didn’t want her leader to partake.

He felt like there was a secret message between all four: redirect her focus now before it’s too late.

Their leader singled out the toffee-haired Northwood from the rest, eyeing her distastefully.

“That I do.” Clarke Griffin’s eyes fluttered towards the beach house in the distance before she turned her attention back to Bryan. “Is he in there?” She tapped her black, jagged wand on her leg.

“He is.” Bryan Station struggled underneath Brell’s boot, but he replied: “I’m supposed to bring you over to meet him.” His eyes watered from the pressure on his neck. But one nod from Clarke to Brell and the pressure lessened. “Those are my orders. I’ve been waiting for you all to arrive.”

“Fancy cottage over yonder.” Echo butted in. Her sepia-colored hair seemed to blend in with the flames. “How do we know it isn’t a trap?”

“Trap?” Bryan yelped incredulously. “You lot think I’ve been freezing my ass out here for a trap?”

“If the meeting’s being held in that cottage’s basement.” Nilyah stated. “It might very well be.”

“We can’t fight our way out of a basement.” Brell spoke. “It’d be a floating bloodbath.”

“Is that where you’re taking us?” Clarke narrowed her eyes: “An ambush underground?”

“No!” The boy protested. “Why in bloody hell would we do that? We’re on the same side!”

“Not yet we’re not.” The blonde-haired tempest of a girl countered. “Not until I’ve had my say.”

She left Bryan and then faced the rugged sea before probing: “Where will the meeting be held?”

“In the parlor.” The boy spoke. “But that’s on the second floor, not the basement!”

“Who the hell builds a parlor on the second floor?”

“I don’t know! I didn’t design the bleeding thing!”

Silence. It ended as soon as it began.

“How many boys are we dealing with?” Clarke turned back around to face him.

“Minus the boss and me?” Bryan answered: “Eight.”

Many curses were exchanged between the others. He guessed it had something to do with the odds.

“That wasn’t part of the agreement!” Lexa voiced out her frustration

“They have the numbers.” Echo warned Clarke, who continued to observe him with steely resolve.

“We should head back at once!” Brell demanded. “This smell has rotten written all over!”

“We can’t trust them.” Nilyah moved to better face her leader. “If we go in there. They’ll hurt us.”

“Let them try.” Clarke Griffin smiled, as if daring the entire world to try and do just that. “He will ask them to leave, of course.” The other girls quieted down while she said this to him. If they had misgivings, they swallowed them for the moment.

“He’d tell them to jump off the floating roof if you asked! And they’d do it without a second thought!” Bryan reasoned to them. “He cares more about meeting you.”

The boy twisted some more to get a better look. “Look there’s stairs next to the parlor, leading to the porch balcony.” He wiggled like a worm. “We can open the door to it if you want.”

“Does the word ‘private’ not mean anything to you?” Nilyah shook her head at him in disbelief.

“Opening a door to the rest of the world takes ‘secret meeting’ right out of things.” Brell snapped.

“I don’t know what else you want.” The boy argued.

“We want it to be safe!” Echo snarled.

“It will be!” Bryan claimed. “I swear it will!”

“It’s too risky.” Lexa expressed her doubts to Clarke. She clearly looked like she was having reservations about the whole thing. “I’ve got a bad feeling about this.”

“No one asked you.” Clarke stung her like a wasp.

Lexa looked surprised by her demeanor. “Clarke-”

Clarke ignored the toffee-haired girl. She analyzed the boy below her like he was just another bug to squash in the summertime before turning around to look at her companions. She bit at her own bottom lip.

They looked to her with uncertainty. Waiting for guidance, for some sort of decision.

It took a while. But she gestured towards the house.

And just like that, they fell in line again. Even if they had felt uneasiness, they kept it to themselves.

Such was the hold Clarke Griffin had over all of them.

“What do we do with the stupid fat hog?” Brell questioned, nodding her head at the Hetoph girl.

“Ontari keeps up appearances so long as we hold her.” Nilyah said. “But we can’t bring her with us.”

“She’s a liability.” Lexa agreed, looking at Costia for the very first time since they all appeared.

Bryan couldn’t tell if that had been a look of concern that crossed her face or a look of disgust.

Clarke Griffin approached Costia, who cowered away from her. “We need to keep the fire going.” She tapped her weeping willow wand against her scalp. “So that Head-Off over here stays warm.” The blonde-haired tempest turned to face the rest of her comrades. “We also need the way back.”

Another hush grew in between them. Bryan realized that none of them wanted to be left back. Clarke seemed to be waiting for someone to offer themselves. It began to look like no one would.

“I’ll stay behind and tend to the fire.” Echo volunteered after a good, long pause. The tall, willowy girl nodded at a surprised Clarke before turning to her fellow warriors: “Keep each other safe, sisters.”

“Always.” Lexa reassured.

“Of course.” Nilyah had smiled.

“You know it.” Brell bowed her head. “We got it.”

“If there’s any trouble, send a flare out the window.” Echo told Clarke firmly. “I’ll come blasting.”

Clarke studied Echo, who then began advancing back towards Costia with malicious intent. “Besides.” She cracked her knuckles. “Someone has to make sure she doesn’t betray us all again.”

An uneasy silence settled in the middle of them all. Echo could be quite a force of nature when left unchecked. Who knew what vile horrors she would commit against Costia while they were away?

“No.” Clarke held out her hand and gripped Echo’s arm, pulling her back: “I need you with me.”

Echo stared at Clarke, the two maintained eye contact for a lengthy amount of time. Before the Azgeda fighter finally nodded softly and wordlessly relented. In normal times, she would never have let her commander go without her. But she trusted the girls who were present, more than any other Slytherin around. Her friend was in good hands. Brell and Nilyah already proved their worth.

They had been one of the few who not only refused to follow in the dissension among their ranks.

Quite the contrary, they fought back against it. Sending many a girl to the hospital wing.

And Lexa. No one ever questioned Lexa’s loyalty to Clarke.

Their bond had always been absolute.

Until now.

Clarke turned to Lexa with a nasty look of distrust upon her face: “Northwood will stay behind.”

Lexa blinked a couple of times, as if she didn’t quite hear her the first time, didn’t quite understand what was being asked of her. “Me?” She looked around at the others who shared her surprise. Her unease. “But I helped set this meeting up.” No answer. The toffee-haired girl spoke: “Why do I-”

“Head-Off is your childhood friend.” Clarke spat. “While Echo and I were set upon by her and her filthy, grubby, traitor sister.” Her eyes turned to slits out of rage. “You were nowhere to be found.”

Lexa’s cheeks reddened at the accusation. Her eyes turned downward. Ever since the New Year’s attack, she had been wracked with guilt over her inability to defend her friends. Clarke had been acting differently towards her. They were no longer close as they once had been. Things changed between them. Relations were not necessarily dead. But they became so strained that it felt like it.

“I’m sorry.”

“I mean your history. All that chemistry. It must have meant a lot to you then. Maybe it does now.”

“I don’t know how many times I’ve told you.” Lexa said quietly. “How sorry I am that happened.”

“She must have quite the hold on your heart if you’re willing to stand by and watch us getting it.”

“I didn’t know, Clarke! I said that I was sorry-”

Brell and Nilyah exchanged an unnerving glance, obviously bothered by what was happening. Echo shifted uncomfortably as well. She never held Lexa accountable for the beating inflicted upon her. But Clarke had. The blonde-haired tempest of a girl hardened the ice around her heart.

And she blamed Lexa for it all. Despite the attempts by her fellow gang members at deflecting her hostility towards different targets, the Slytherin girl seemed to grow angrier as of late. More distant.

A wrath brewed inside of Clarke Griffin. It grew with every passing day. The other girls felt it too.

“That’s all I ever hear from you.” Clarke mocked. “I’m sowwy.” She taunted her in a sing-song baby voice. “I’m so sowwy. Pwease fogwive me.” It sounded so theatrically cruel, like a bad joke.

“Clarke-” Lexa began. The flush upon her cheeks grew in color. She’d never seen this side of her.

“Words are wind, Northwood.” The blonde-haired tempest hissed through clenched teeth. “Liars spout words all the time and they don’t mean a thing.” She signaled the others. Bryan was freed from his boot hold. Nilyah pulled him to his feet and kept her own wand trained at the back of his neck. “It’s actions that matter.” Clarke snapped her fingers so that the sand went into Costia’s eyes.

The Hetoph girl cried out in dismay and struggled to clean them out. But Echo made sure to step on the back of her head on her way to join the others. Costia grunted from that hard blow as well.

“Actions are what remain.” Clarke explained, as if Lexa was a convict in a prison condemned to die. Bryan had never seen anyone look as angry as she did now. The stare she gave Lexa looked downright enraged: “They’re all that’s left when the bastards have taken away everything else.”

Lexa blinked as the blonde girl aggressively brushed past her and then moved away far from her.

“So, prove it to me.” She stood in front of the other three girls so that the fire divided them from the other two across the way. “Let your actions speak for your loyalty. For once.”

Lexa stared back at her in silence. Her eyes teared up, but she quickly brushed them away with her palms. She had always been by Clarke’s side when things looked bad. And the one time she wasn’t.

“Lexa.” Costia sobbed. She was still trying to rub the sand out of her eyes with her knuckles. “I can’t see anything.” The Hetoph girl reached around like a blind beggar. “Please help me. Lexa-”

And those words.

They were all it took for it to happen with such sudden movement, like a sidewinder’s lethal strike.

The Northwood girl let loose a ferocious backhand that smashed into Costia’s face, sending her sprawling onto the sand. Blood spilled from her mouth. Bryan shook his head at the girl’s actions.

“It’s a start.” Clarke smiled a savage kind of smile. “Let’s leave them to it.”

The blonde-haired tempest led the others towards the cottage in the distance. Lexa stared after all of them, her face a mask of volcanic red. Her shoulders trembled, she looked ready to break down.

“I’m sure she still has a lot to discuss with her lover.” Clarke sang ruthlessly while she walked away. Lexa’s mouth opened with shock at that. Bryan could see, even when they were yards away, that the Northwood girl burst into tears. He figured she wanted to wait until there was distance.

“Lead the way.” Clarke commanded him.

Echo angrily pushed the boy forward ahead of them. Brell took out her wand as well and joined Nilyah in keeping watch over him. Bryan leaned slightly back in order to get a better look at their appearances. The four of them wore various shades of green underneath midnight black hoodies, fur-trimmed travel cloaks, and dark grey jackets.

The girls mentioned sleepover, so it would stand to reason that they’d be wearing nightie dresses, pajamas, and robes. But these girls looked upper-crust, straight up aristocratic. Their sleepwear was all very elegant and tailor-made. Bryan couldn’t tell which were silk and which were Egyptian cotton. Nilyah wore an overgrown long-sleeved shirt that ended mid-thigh with shorts underneath.

But her shirt’s bottle-green was nothing like the avocado nightdress that Brell wore with lace cuffs.

Clarke and Echo wore clothing that made them look equal parts gorgeous and ready for combat. Griffin’s jade nightgown had dark brown greaves etched into the shoulders and a string-laced corset garb. It all resembled a form of armor, these knitted greaves. Fur etched into the collar folds.

Azgeda’s olive medieval long-sleeves were ethereal atop her sweat pants which had many pockets filled with God knows what underneath a thick, wool-clipped cargo jacket. But Bryan opened his mouth at the knife strapped to her ribcage in a sleek, black leather holster. He swallowed nervously at it all.

And did the stupidest thing he could’ve done.

“You lot are overdressed.” Bryan joked, hoping to lighten the mood. “We’re not in a warzone. This is peacetime.” He didn’t know why he did it. Had it been stupidity? Carelessness? Or both?

A loud crack could be heard. Something hot and hard struck him in the center of his back, between both shoulder blades. The boy flew forward, face-planting into the sand. When he tried to get up, a second blow towards his abdomen sent him reeling through the dunes. A third drove him back.

The pain was unlike anything he’d ever felt before.

It bypassed his skin and muscles and drilled straight for the marrow in his bones.

“You’re a funny boy.” Clarke articulated softly to him. “A very funny boy. Quite the comedian.”

When he didn’t answer, she grabbed his hair and pulled him up by it. Bryan squealed from the pain he felt under her grip. He felt the crooked edges of her weeping willow wand upon his throat.

“What is peacetime-” The blonde-haired tempest crooned: “-but the lull between battles?”

Bryan felt the air leave his mouth. Leave his lungs. But nothing refilled their places. He began gasping for air, clawing at his Adam’s apple. Choking out unintelligible pleas for a respite. Bryan went to his knees again, eyes tearing up at the injustice of it all. Clarke let go of his hair and the other girls watched him warily as he keeled over, writhing on the sand like a freshly caught fish.

It was as if someone was telling the air to ignore him and cater to everyone else who was around.

The boy thought he was going to die right then and there. It certainly felt like it.

Another minute more and he would’ve blacked out.

But then the air traveled back inside himself and filled all the spots it left behind.

The boy gasped and panted like his life depended on it. He looked up at Clarke Griffin who stared down at him with pleasure. He prayed he never knew what made her this way.

She was so broken.

Her mind had to be cracked. It had to be.

“See what happens the next time you waste my time.” The blonde-haired tempest threatened him.

Bryan, after Brell and Nilyah pulled him back to his feet, nodded in more ways than one.

The walk back to the beach house, after all that, was especially noiseless.

And when they reached the cottage, Clarke made Bryan take them around the house, towards the staircase he had told them about way back when. The whole time, he saw the girls scan every nook and cranny of the building’s exterior, as if looking for any signs of weakness in its infrastructure.

For possible entry and escape, should any unwanted situations arise.

The boy led them up the steps quietly. The girls made a formation that looked in four directions. Wands were pointed north, south, east, and west the whole time. Bryan almost soiled himself when one of the steps creaked, Clarke gripped the back of his shirt tightly. The sounds of rowdy boys could be heard as they traversed. Laughing loudly, telling bawdy jokes, being straight up obnoxious.

Bryan wanted to shout for them. To yell out the danger currently around him. But he feared what the blonde-haired tempest had recently done. She nearly killed him and thought nothing of it.

It even looked like she was enjoying her actions.

He also feared what she and her band of witches would do to everyone else if he outed them.

Their level of magic, their level of discipline and organization. They were less like a group of girls.

And more like a militia.

When they made it to the balcony porch overlooking the beach and the fire in the distance where the other two girls were, the way inside in plain sight, they turned him around to face their wands.

“Where is he?” Clarke asked. Her black and crooked weeping willow wand rested beneath his chin. “Choose your words carefully.” Bryan shuddered at the thought of losing air again. Fear threatened to empty his bladder. The girl pressed the wood into his neck. “I’ll know it if you lie.”

“Downstairs with the lads.” Bryan hyperventilated. “We’re getting ready for the game.”

“Once we enter.” The blonde-haired tempest whispered. “Get him to come up.”

“How?”

“Go to the middle of the stairs and call him.”

“You’ll let me go?”

“No further than the middle. We’ll be watching.”

“Alright.”

“Tell him that he can bring two others to level out the playing field if he so desires. But only two.”

“What if he doesn’t agree to those terms?”

“Then I’ve enjoyed your company, Bryan Station.”

“How do you know my-”

They pushed him towards the opening outside the balcony’s porch, the one that would lead them all indoors. The boy gripped its bronze handle and glanced at the copper owl knocker at the front. Its metallic eyes judged every move that he made. He could feel all four wands trained on his back.

Bryan closed his eyes and turned it open so they could all enter.

The parlor was a quaint sort of place. There was a bar with many a Wizarding World drink stacked high above and below the shelves behind its smooth wooden counter. A bowl of cashews and other assorted nuts rested on its surface. Deep in the corner of the room was a pool table with a triangular block holding together all the cue balls with sticks hanging off to the side and a tiny block of chalk.

From the outside, the cottage looked to be a small and old-fashioned undertaking. But magic knew no bounds in their world. The outside was in no way, shape or form, a reflection of its inside. The space inside was much, much bigger. There were several tables and chairs scattered all over the parlor. The room could fit dozens and dozens of people for dining purposes if the hosts wanted to.

They could see a stage for musicians to play on.

There was even a piano far off in the distance.

The last girl inside made sure to close the door gently.

“Brell, guard the balcony door.” Clarke instructed. She turned towards the dirty blonde girl next. “Nilyah, take cover behind the bar.” The blonde-haired tempest then turned to Echo. “With me.”

The pair of Slytherins forced Bryan towards the staircase. Both girls were so well-versed in their communication, they barely needed words to know what each other wanted. It was as if their thoughts coincided with one another.

If he didn’t know any better, he would’ve thought them telepaths.

“One wrong move.” Echo cautioned. She gestured her angel oak wand towards him in a circular motion: “And we send you flying down the stairs. Face first.”

“He knows.” Clarke clarified. “The boy’s no Gryffindor. He’d be a fool to do anything stupid.”

“We’ve known lesser Gryffindors who’ve done that and more.”

“Clearly.”

Bryan moved towards the center of the staircase. The voices of his friends grew louder and louder as he encroached closer and closer. There was laughter and joking and cursing and rough-housing.

He could hear the projector screen in the background, showing the announcer’s pre-game analysis.

It seemed like Germany was the overall favorite to win. He was glad he wasn’t alone on that account.

The boy took a deep breath.

If they sent him crashing, his face would be pulverized by the polished tile floor below. He needed to follow along or risk swallowing a mouthful of broken teeth. The Slytherins were as terrifying as nightmares. They were forces to be reckoned with. But they were all nothing compared to him.

If there was something his own leader had that others didn’t: it was absolute control over them all.

The lads believed in him.

Bryan believed in him.

Each one of them were loyal to his wishes. They’d follow him to the ends of the earth if he’d ask.

Because he was good and righteous and always took care of his friends in the end. It took quite a bit of doing, but the boss had spent the majority of his first-year winning them all over one by one.

The boy on the stairs would always be thankful for that.

“Finn!” The boy called loudly from the middle of all the many steps. “Your guests have arrived!”

Everyone downstairs quieted. Not all at once. First there were rapid whisperings and even quicker shushing noises, but they all seemed to be directed towards a singular source. Like a reverse-epicenter. Someone was settling them down. Concerns were exchanged, nervous mutterings, and even a curse here and there. But they calmed. The projector then turned off. Followed by footsteps.

Finn Collins arrived at the bottom of the staircase. He looked every bit as handsome as the other girls from other Great Houses claimed. They’d whisper about him amongst themselves. His sleek black hair was combed and gelled just right, so much so that it resembled a natural wavy structure.

After all, he was the most popular first year, now second year, boy in Hogwarts.

Finn had a smooth jawline with even smoother cheekbones, and he wore a collared shirt underneath a thin cerulean sweater. The khaki pants he had on complimented his own polished black loafers.

The boy had yellow eyes. They resembled the color of amber or honey. Either of the two worked.

And he reeked of money, the same kind of money from some of the Slytherin girls’ background.

His parents owned this beach house and a dozen other properties, both personal and professional, that stretched for acres and acres. They were successful entrepreneurs and landowners who took the Wizarding World by storm. The boy was no different. He was upper crust like the rest of them.

“Bryan.” Finn nodded at the boy on the steps. Other boys were beginning to join him. From left and right, they went to accompany Finn. “I thought you were going to take them through the front.”

The boys varied in size and skin color. A couple were light, a couple were dark. Some were big, some were small. Many were thin, few were fat. There was acne and braces, buck teeth and pug noses. All sweaty pits. If there was a boy factory nearby, it would’ve made a funny sort of sense.

The members of this fraternity looked like preppy and sporty renditions of each other.

“I would’ve.” Bryan answered shakily. “I was going to.” He then jerked his head behind him. “They had other plans.” Hope began to grow inside of him at the sight of all the other boys’ wands.

Finn looked towards the pair of Slytherin girls standing above his friend. He raised his brows and chewed his inner cheek thoughtfully at the two of them, taking in the dire situation in front of him.

Then he bowed.

Politely, of course.

“Ladies.” Finn’s voice was welcoming. “I’m glad you could make the trip.”

Neither girl spoke. Echo had scowled at them all. But Clarke’s own gaze was an icy sort of silence.

“Bryan.” The good-looking boy stared pointedly at his friend. “Didn’t I tell you to stick with Lexa?” He smiled at the boy before shaking his head ruefully as if to tell him: ‘See what happens?’

“You did.”

“She was the one who helped organize all this, was she not?”

“She was.”

“Where is she?”

“Guarding a hostage on the beach.”

“Shit.”

“It’s not one of ours.”

“Thank God for that!”

“Clarke said to bring two.”

“Two what?”

“Friends.”

“Are there more up there?”

“Yes.” Bryan held out two fingers.

“I see.” Finn nodded at his sly sign.

“Might I suggest.” Bryan chanced a glance at the two girls behind him before darting back to the boys at bottom of the stairs. “Meat and potatoes?” He hoped beyond hoping that he’d understand.

Finn chuckled like he always did whenever they made their inside joke. “Meat and potatoes, it is.”

He turned to the rest of the boys who fell in line to listen.

“Dax.” Finn slapped a hand on an enormous boy’s shoulder. “Illian.” He nodded at another, lean and long-haired. “The rest of you stay here.” The other six boys all whinged at once. “And relax!”

They didn’t seem to want to take turns talking over each other. They complained at the same time.

Chaotically.

“Bullshit!”

“This is your bloody place!”

“Don’t let them make all the rules!”

“Mate, if you go up there: you’re theirs!”

“We can’t trust a bunch of floating snakes!”

“They’re poisonous!”

“That’s enough!” Finn’s voice suddenly boomed loudly. He pointed his wand, a piece of cherry blossom tree, at his own throat.

It turned his vocal cords into a microphone.

“Cook up those sausages.” The boy told them calmly. “There’s more than enough drinks in the fridge.” Finn Collins turned to face the rest of his friends, like a well-groomed politician. And he was one. You could tell just by the way he spoke. “Get ready for the game. This won’t take long.”

But the other boys wouldn’t budge. They didn’t want to leave him and others up there unprotected.

“I brought you all here to have a good time, didn’t I?” Finn reassured them. “So that’s exactly what we’re going to do.” He was good at captivating them, the way he looked at each one like they mattered. “We’re all looking forward to trouncing all those lousy, miserable krauts! Right boys?”

One by one they began to loosen up. Some cheered ‘right’ back to him. Some clapped their hands.

“What do I want you guys to do?” Finn asked them all.

“Relax.” They all began echoing unevenly back to him.

“Stay down here.” The handsome boy commanded. “And have a good time.” He smiled. “On me.”

That seemed to be enough to sway them.

Until she spoke.

“Let them know that if they try for the balcony.” Clarke drawled. “They’ll have a rough time of it.”

Bryan felt cold all over. What did that mean? He hadn’t checked if she left behind any trap spells.

He had been facing away from her the whole time.

Bryan turned to face Clarke Griffin atop the stairs. The boy couldn’t tell if she was bluffing or not.

His friends stared daggers at the Griffin girl. They looked about ready to go up in arms against her.

“That won’t be necessary.” Finn laughed as if her threat was the funniest of jokes. He raised both of his hands to settle them all back down. One by one they had obeyed. “They do as they’re told.”

And that was how the meeting came to be. In the middle of the summer before their second year.

Bryan parked himself at the bar with Finn. Dax lumbered nearby at the pool table with Illian. The thick boy’s bulging muscles were their secret weapon whenever things looked dodgy back in Hogwarts. None of the boys from the other Houses stood a chance against him. He was their mountain. Illian on the other hand was the craftiest one of them all and he was always smiling. As if he knew something that everyone else didn’t. The boy was best known for always fighting dirty.

But it was Finn who called the shots.

He packed the charisma.

And like a snake oil salesman from the Western pictures, combined with the swagger of a pirate, he became flamboyant in his bodily gestures. Finn knew how to speak to people. His influence was widespread among the social cliques and circles that developed around Hogwarts. He could find out what your goals were just by trading a few verbal blows with you and then pledge to help you with your aspirations. If anything was law in this world. It was Finn Collins’s ability to talk.

He knew when to raise his voice and when to lower it. He knew when to turn it sweet.

And he knew all the ways of winning you over.

The good-looking boy was doing it right now.

Or attempting to, at least.

“All of you can scrap.” Finn commented nonchalantly as he leaned against the bar next to Bryan. Having him nearby was enough to put even the boy’s largest fears to rest. He always felt more confident next to him. Always felt stronger. “How else could you have gotten Bryan to surrender?”

Bryan felt the handsome boy jokingly slap a hand on the back of his shoulders.

“My boy’s always been solid.” Finn bragged to everyone in the room. “Straight down the line. No floating about.” He nudged Bryan playfully with his elbow. “That’s him.” He jerked his thumb.

Dax just fired off an unrestrained shot with his pool stick. The collision between cue balls was louder than expected. He glared at all the girls around them before moving to the other side of the pool table. Illian stood nearby, drilling the tip of his own pool stick into the tiny cube of chalk. He was smiling. As always.

“Is it the training?” Finn wondered aloud to Clarke. “I’ve heard tell of you drilling your girls like proper soldiers.” He rocked himself while he talked. “Day in and day out. Rain or shine. All summer long.”

Clarke and Echo began placing anti-eavesdropping charms on the stairs and the balcony door. Brell went to accompany the piano, her body on high alert. The look exchanged between her and Clarke made it seem like the plan was to use the massive instrument as a projectile.

If such a thing was possible for them to do.

“We’re clearly no match for you.” The good-looking boy admitted. “We wouldn’t stand a chance.”

Nilyah remained behind the bar, watching over Finn and Bryan. When the boy’s leader attempted to flash a smile at her, her stoic face refused to move.

“I’ll say this as well.” Finn continued conversationally, watching as the remaining spells became set in stone. “You girls are very thorough when it comes to work.”

Clarke approached where they were now. Echo tagged along. The girl’s right hand was near her right hand. Well, shoulder to be more accurate. The two leaders stared each other down with zeal.

“One of these days.” Finn said to Clarke. “I do hope we’ll be able to trust each other.”

“I doubt it.” Clarke said to Finn. “Now is there a point to your meaningless filibuster?”

Everyone in the room waited with bated breath on what would come next.

“Or are you always this boring?” The blonde-haired tempest finished.

Bryan guessed the girls were all waiting to see if he would grow angry.

But he knew Finn best.

You would know when he was angry. And when you came to your senses about it.

It would already be too late.

Finn burst out laughing and began joyously clapping his hands together. “That was a good one!”

Clarke frowned at him. She had been expecting a different reaction. The boy was one crazy joker.

“Congratulations, by the way!” He turned to the other three Slytherins and gave them all a jubilant thumbs-up: “On winning the House Cup last term!”

That had been ages ago. And the score had been nothing short of a landslide. The Slytherins had greedily accumulated a nauseating amount of points. Clarke should’ve felt happiness and pride with her victory over the other Great Houses. But she hadn't. If anything, she felt even more hollow and empty about it all. The conquest meant nothing to her. She thought it was what she wanted. What she needed. But she was wrong.

The Slytherin prodigy didn't know what she wanted anymore. All she knew was that she saw red everywhere now. Around every corner and behind every face. Clarke felt angry all the time. She knew if she didn't find an outlet for all this rage, it would consume her. Chew her up whole and spit out her bones. She needed a target again. Fast. 

None of her girls answered to his comment.

Finn Collins did have quite the sense of humor.

But he always knew when to cut to the chase.

Especially when his japes provoked little reaction.

“I wanted all of us to meet.” The handsome boy gestured to everyone there. “So, we could talk.”

“Talk about what?” Clarke asked impatiently. Her knuckles whitened around her weeping willow.

“Our common goal.”

“And what goal would that be?”

“The expulsion of the Broken Lion Boys.” Finn simplified for them all: “Permanently of course.”

The void left behind after that statement was staggering. None of the girls seemed to expect that.

Not even Clarke, who raised her eyebrows in astonishment and stepped on closer towards the boy.

“Any of their retainers would do as well.” Finn calculated in his head. “The ones they hang with.”

“Why do you care about what happens to them?” She asked carefully. “What reason do you have?”

“I’ve got a bone to pick with Bellamy Blake.” He replied. “And I know I’m not the only one.”

Finn and Clarke exchanged such a look of understanding. All hostility seemed to vanish all at once.

But not suspicion.

“That's not exactly specific.” Clarke remarked.

“No, it isn’t.” Finn stated. He shrugged his shoulders. “But I’ll tell you why in the wars to come.”

He sank his hand into the bowl of assorted nuts on the bar surface and fisted a bunch. Finn dropped a few into his mouth and crunched before depositing the rest into Bryan’s hands. The boy stood up and cracked his neck, stretching out his arms above and behind his back. He looked to them all.

“And when that day arrives.” Finn told everyone else. “We’ll need a lot more liquor than this lot.”

The handsome boy gestured to the shelves above and below the bar.

“Now.” He began with exaggerated vigor as if there was a drum roll. “Where’s the good stuff?”

Finn Collins clapped his hands and used a nearby stool to vault over the bar in theatrical fashion.

Nilyah’s eyes widened at the sudden maneuver and pointed her wand at Finn as he crossed. But one look from Clarke to her and she lowered it. Finn clapped his hands again and began rubbing them together like a desperate street urchin rubbing a genie out of an imaginary lamp.

He continued to chant: “Good stuff” repeatedly.

“We’re not allowed to drink!” Bryan voiced out in dismay. He checked right and left for any potential adults. As if they might show themselves at any given minute: “We’re not old enough!”

“Would you stop being such a prude?” Finn groaned, rolling his eyes. He searched high and low in the bar’s liquor cabinets. “Why don’t you live a little, huh? Life’s too short for that nonsense.”

“If there’s anything that boy’s useful for.” Dax laughed heartily from afar: “It’s being a prune!”

“The term is ‘prude’, dumb-dumb.” Illian described dryly. “Prune is a dried plum that you eat.”

“What’s the difference?” The large boy asked stupidly.

Illian pinched the bridge of his nose and sighed hopelessly for his friend. He shook his head in fake despair.

“Where’d you dig this one up?” Echo pointed at their giant, giggling madly. “The junkyard?”

“WHY DON’T YOU SHUT YOUR BLOODY HOLE!” Dax exploded violently out of the blue.

In an instant, all four Slytherin girls aimed their respective wands at the bulky hulk of a boy with a tomato red expression. Magic surged through their rigid bodies and pulsed with their mood. Echo smiled viciously at the fuming colossus; her angel oak wand’s tip seemed destined for his face.

“Tell that ape to clam up if he knows what’s good for him.” The Azgeda threatened. “Or I will.”

“COME AND MAKE ME CLAM UP!” Dax roared. “YOU MEWLING LITTLE QUIM!”

Echo gripped the knife’s handle strapped to her rib cage with her other free hand. She unsheathed a bit of steel.

Bryan had ducked below the bar at the sudden Mexican Standoff. Dax had the eight ball in his hand. He clutched a fist around it, shaking it with a murderous rage. Illian backed away from the raging bull of a boy with his hands up. But Finn studied his mountain, unimpressed.

Their boss was holding a bottle of moss-colored absinthe in his hands with a lavish lavender label.

It was the first time Bryan saw him displeased since the entire evening began.

“Put that down.” Finn ordered. “You stupid buffoon.” A cold rage had enveloped him. But Finn Collins refused to let it taint his facial features. “You’re ruining everything I’ve worked so hard for.”

Dax turned to his leader and whined like a sullen brat: “But she-”

“Did I stutter?” Finn’s eyes flashed intensely at the boy’s insolence. “Do it now or you will pay.”

Their vast associate seemed to shy away from the bar in the parlor. It always amazed Bryan how his friend was able to masterfully dominate Dax with words alone. He marveled at his unique ability.

It seemed like Dax didn’t want to shy away from this fight. He could always handle friends teasing him.

But never strangers.

The mountain, Dax, continued to give the viper, Echo, the stink eye.

Until Finn slammed down the liquor bottle he had in his hands with a loud ‘bang’. Dax dropped the eight ball as if he’d been shot. Finn then moved his finger along his own lips like a zipper. The boy’s mouth disappeared. Clarke felt a jolt of déjà -vu. His spell mirrored the ones they used to do to Harper McIntyre in the past. Only they magically glued it shut instead of doing away with it.

Dax hummed out his displeasure at the punishment dealt to him. But Finn was far from finished.

“Sit down.” Finn commanded. Dax moved like he was a puppet and Finn the puppeteer. He sat down. “And cool off.” The large boy’s facial expression turned dimmer than a burnt-out lightbulb.

He looked like his mind had drifted. Far from the parlor in the beach house near the Atlantic Ocean.

There were times, not a lot, but quite a few, when Finn’s mask would slip. That articulate and kind boy who captured crowds with his wit and humor. He hid something away from the rest of the world. Bryan saw it’s face come out during times of great turmoil. Finn’s true nature was scary. Scarier than anything else he’d seen. Until Clarke stole the air out of his body. That had rivaled it.

It was a stormy kind of relationship. The one Finn had with his boys. One minute he’d treat them all like family, another minute he’d treat them like foes. It all depended on the day and the time. Like a coin toss. You never knew which face you were going to get. Or how long it would all last.

Sure, they loved him.

But they feared him as well.

“I’d like to apologize for my colleague’s behavior.” Finn began making amends as if nothing happened. All four girls lowered their wands. “We don’t bring him with us to do any of the thinking.” He snapped open the foil cover of the bottle and used a corkscrew to pop open its lid.

“What do you bring him along for?” Brell asked from far away.

“The doing.” Finn answered. He began taking out decanter crystal glasses and started chipping away rocks of ice from a nearby miniature freezer with a pick.

“That sounds ominous.” Nilyah commented.

“You have your brains.” The handsome boy smiled at her. “We have our brawn.”

“Dax has quite the temper.” Bryan nodded at the deaf and dumb giant. “It gets out of control sometimes. He can have a bit of a nasty streak.”

“Don’t we all.” Echo grimly sheathed her knife back into its holster.

“It has its uses.” Illian chortled at his friend’s precarious position. He waved a hand in front of his face and harassed him with repetitive ‘yoo-hoos’. “Not everyone’s as resilient as they once were.”

“None of us are.” Clarke muttered.

“Iris tells me this-” Finn began pouring the moss-colored absinthe into seven cups. Bryan deduced that his friend wanted to leave Dax out of the equation. “-is the best out of all the pubs in London.”

“Who’s Iris?” Brell questioned. She remained at her post by the piano.

“A friend of ours.” Bryan and Illian answered at the same time. They pointed to each other in turn.

“Why isn’t she here with you?” Nilyah raised an eyebrow.

“She’s watching the World Cup Final first hand with Maya Vie and her parents.” Finn said jealously. But it was in good fun. He respected his two fellow House-mates: “Lucky little minxes.”

“Iris would know best.” Bryan said. “She’s good with a knife.”

“Understatement.” Illian corrected. He tip-toed towards the parlor’s bar in a light-fingered sort of way. “The best.” He made it there: “I’ve seen what she can do to a slab of venison with a knife.”

“Have you ever seen what I can do with a knife?” Echo inquired. She made her way to the bar too.

“Can’t say that I have.” Illian grinned.

“Then she isn’t the best.” Echo declared with such confidence that Bryan wanted to admire her.

And he would’ve, if she hadn’t scared the ever-living shit out of him.

“Why does Hufflepuff-” Clarke moved in front of Finn’s place at the bar: “-seek to destroy Gryffindor?”

“Destroy?” Finn stared at her blankly. “What kind of dynasty warriors crap have you been watching?”

It all seemed too good to be true. And from her experiences with these matters. Such things were.

“Convince me.” The blonde-haired tempest demanded. “Or we leave you, here and now.”

“You’re the genius.” The handsome boy proclaimed: “The Slytherin girl wonder. Can’t you tell?”

Clarke gave her three girls an exasperated look. They joined up again and nearly left the parlor.

“Loyalty!” Finn boomed for all to hear. “That is the essence of a Hufflepuff’s character, is it not?”

The four Slytherin girls stopped in their tracks.

“Loyalty to family.” The Hufflepuff boy said. “Loyalty to friends. Loyalty to the hand that feeds.”

Clarke Griffin slowly paced her way back to the Collins boy.

“Is it so hard to believe-” Finn continued: “-that Hufflepuffs can be loyal to themselves and only themselves?”

Bryan and Illian straightened their backs with every word that dripped out of their boss’s mouth.

“That all our noble and hard-working intentions-” Their leader lectured: “-are selfish and self-preserving?”

He began to sound more and more correct. That was Finn’s lure. His ability to make it sound like he always knew what he was talking about. Even when he didn’t. He knew ways on how to bullshit.

And he drew them all near to him.

Like moths to a flame.

Or insects to a Venus Flytrap.

“Hufflepuffs of old used to be heroes back when Hogwarts had been founded.” Finn admitted.

He cupped his hands and blew a revolting sort of farting noise.

“But the years have no doubt drained all of that away.” Finn finished: “Times have changed.”

“Disgraces to Diggory.” Clarke eyed the three remaining Hufflepuffs in the room with distaste.

“Cedric Diggory was honorable.” Finn conceded. “He was honest and good. He also died. Badly.”

Finn Collins laid out all seven cups of algae-looking absinthe on top of the bar’s smooth and polished wooden surface.

“Whenever I think of honesty and honor, I think back to what had happened to Cedric Diggory.”

The look the boy gave them all was that of a completely enlightened person. Like he saw all truths.

Not just the one.

“And then I understand why those things have no place in this world of ours.”

Clarke held her girls back from nearing the bar and the drinks the Hufflepuff boy offered to them.

Finn sighed at her actions and grumbled: “No one trusts the nice guy.”

He took one of the cups and drained it. He heaved violently afterwards. “Galloping gargoyles!”

His coughing fit continued with Bryan and Illian attempting to help him. Finn waved them away.

“By Dumbledore’s name.” The handsome boy croaked. “That’s some strong stuff.”

“You aren’t villains.” Clarke remarked. “You’re barely bad guys.”

“No bad guy thinks they’re the evil one.” Finn retorted. “Until someone else accuses them of evil.”

"And now Hufflepuff joins the fray." The blonde girl said: "So much for neutrality."

"It doesn't mean much these days." The brunette boy spoke: "He doesn't belong there."

Clarke took in the Hufflepuff's words. She played around with them in her mind. 

"You know it. I know it." Finn told the Slytherin: "So let's do something about it." 

The blonde-haired tempest nodded her head in agreement. 

Afterwards, when everyone toasted to each other as allies. With the message being: to bringing about the end of Gryffindors and Ravenclaws. All of them drank their fill and refilled to drink some more. Not out of happiness or joy. But out of equal fortitude. Like soldiers sharing one more drink before some bastard of a battle. The absinthe was strong and sharp and foul and fierce.

It was also necessary.

“I don’t expect you to trust me outright.” Finn admitted to Clarke. “You need proof of my good will.” He curtsied for her in a gentlemanly, knight-like manner. “In my experience, the way to a girl’s heart is with a gift.” Bryan couldn’t tell if he was drunk or ballsy. Finn could be a lightweight at times.

The Hufflepuff boy turned to Brell. “That piano you’ve been guarding so well is holding it inside.”

The coal-haired Slytherin girl looked to Clarke for permission. The blonde-haired girl granted it.

When Brell returned to the piano, she opened its lid. The one that concealed all its inner workings.

And then she pulled out Finn Collins’s present.

A bouquet of burgundy flowers.

Clarke surged towards her friend and took it out of her hands.

They resembled poinsettias only they weren’t. Their petals were ballistic and spiky. They held such archaic and powerful magic, the channels in which it all traveled intersected at the flower’s center bud. Never ending specks of violet pollen began leaking out of the bundle of flowers’ sides.

“How did you know?” Clarke turned to Finn.

“Lexa told me what you were planning.” The boy beamed at her. “And I think it’s a brilliant idea.”

“These are extremely rare.” The blonde girl breathed with amazement. “Extremely expensive.”

“Debatable.” The handsome boy drummed a tune with his fingers. “But if it’s time and money you’re after.” He winked at her with vanity: “Those are resources that my family has plenty of.”

Finn observed the way Clarke handled the magical flowers as if they were made of fragile glass.

“Will they be enough?”

“More than enough.”

“How long?"

“They’re still in bloom.” Clarke smirked deviously. “And these specific flowers bloom for months and months. It’ll be a long while before they’re at maximum potency.” She turned to him and shrugged as if to say: 'too floating bad'.

“I’m not hearing a date?” Finn began to look more and more disappointed by the second. “How long will we have to wait?”

“Spring.” The blonde-haired tempest smiled her signature kind of savage. “Spring is when we’ll strike.”

“During the Duelist’s Dominion tournament?” The good-looking boy opened his mouth in awe.

“The very same one.”

“Wicked.”

Clarke moved to the edge in order to hand the flowers over to Nilyah who cradled them with care.

“That’s not all.” Finn boasted: "I've got one more surprise for you!" 

The Griffin girl spun around to face him with curiosity etched into every bit of her confused gaze.

The Collins boy put two sets of fingers to his lips and whistled.

Illian began marching like a tin soldier towards the stage and grabbed onto something.

Only something wasn’t there. Or that was what it seemed. It was thin air that he was grabbing.

Illian held a bunch of it in his hands and moved it all away like the secret fabric that it had been.

The lean and long-haired boy pulled the Invisibility Cloak they kept hidden away from the girls.

And there, exposed for all to see, lay an unconscious Bryan Station.

“I have something to report.” The Bryan Station they brought back from the beach turned to Finn.

Clarke and the other three Slytherin girls that accompanied her stared at the boy with sickening horror.

“There is discord in the Slytherin camp.” He smiled wolfishly: “Clarke has lost all trust in Lexa.”

All four girls pointed their wands at the Station boy before Finn hurtled over the bar to shield him.

“You didn’t honestly think I’d stand a chance against Clarke Griffin.” Finn Collins sneered: “Unless I could prove-” He raised both his hands at their wands: “-that I’m just as ruthless as her?”

The wristwatch that the Bryan Station doppelganger behind him wore began singing loudly like an opera sonata. Its glass face lit up with bright purpose. Only the boy’s own magical timekeeper was never meant to keep track of the girls’ arrival. No, it kept tabs on an entirely different matter.

The alarm had finally rung.

Which meant time was up.

The Polyjuice Potion.

It began wearing off.

This Bryan Station’s face began to morph. It twisted and turned like a melted candle’s waxy base.

The skin began to shear off like ribbons of cut-up parchment. Only the paper was the imposter’s flesh. And it shed the stolen identity of the poor patsy they invited over and forcefully put to sleep. The boy cried and fought them the whole time. He was a slow-learner. But he learned in the end.

Finn Collins’s well-hidden ace in the hole was finally revealed to the four Slytherins there.

“It’s been a while.” Finn wagged both his eyebrows suggestively at these girls. “Hasn’t it, Jon?”

Gryffindor’s Murphy wrapped an arm around his friend’s neck and sniggered like a scornful rogue.

“The prodigal son has returned.” Jonathan Murphy broadcasted.

“YOU!” Clarke echoed the same kind of aggravated outrage her friends shared. “But you’re my-”

“Spy?” Murphy laughed. “Did you really expect loyalty from a traitor?”

Nothing had belonged to him. Not the clothes, not the meek persona. Not even the blackthorn wand. Jon Murphy’s own wand had been a slender strip of pine with a tint of maple resin within.

The flush on Clarke Griffin’s cheeks looked to be set ablaze by the eye-opener. Her body trembled.

“Did they hurt you?” Finn asked the boy next to him.

“Nothing I couldn’t handle.” Murphy singled out Clarke with a nod. “This one came awfully close.”

“What the hell are you lot playing at?” Echo snarled dangerously at them both. “What is all this?”

“We’re about to initiate a war on two fronts.” Finn addressed. “And all wars need their weapons.”

He motioned to the burgundy flowers he gifted to them: “You have yours.”

Finn ruffled Murphy’s thorny, chocolate-colored hair: “Now I have mine.”

“You’re referring to this rat?” Clarke spat at the two of them. “What can he even do?”

“I will rip the Broken Lion Boys apart.” Murphy promised them all: “From the inside out.”


	2. Love Is The Magic Hidden...

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Harper holds onto hope...
> 
> “Lullaby For A Stormy Night” by Vienna Teng

Countless hours earlier that Saturday, thousands of miles away from the beach and summer cottage where a vile scheme would be hatched for the upcoming school year, Harper McIntyre awoke in bed.

On the outskirts of Arcadia, the small, sleepy countryside village where she and her family lived.

It was the rain that woke her. In the earliest of morning hours, long before the sun began rising above the horizon, the sky rumbled with sounds of distant thunder. The rain came down in torrents.

As if every individual cloud held its own waterfall and beat onto the roof of her family’s home. Water pitter-pattered against their farmhouse’s windows. It drowned the earth outside by the acre.

Harper patted a blind hand around her bedside table for those thick glasses of hers and shoved them onto her face. They went askew in her haste, so she’d moved both hands to straighten them.

She saw a prickly flash of lightning through the window before hearing the crashing roar that followed. It illuminated the inside of her bedroom, lighting up the walls for her to see in the dark.

There were posters plastered north, south, east, and west. She sought out three of them specifically.

An artistic mural of the Fellowship of the Ring surrounded by the paint-stroked darkness of Moria. The dim glow of Gandalf’s staff, Aragorn’s longsword, Legolas’s bow ready to strike, Gimli’s sturdy axe, and Boromir’s shield and broadsword. Frodo held the ring, surrounded by his fellow hobbit companions: Sam, Merry, and Pippin. This band of brothers stood against a horde of orcs.

Another tapestry showed Lyra Silvertongue and Will Parry side by side with their respective Dark Materials, the alethiometer and the subtle knife. An armored Iorek Byrnison roared next to Lee Scoresby aiming down his rifle. The witches, led by Serafina Pekkala, and their daemons soared above. Lord Asriel and Mrs. Coulter confronted an angel across a never-ending abyss of darkness.

But her favorite poster, the one she loved most of all, showed the brave rabbits of Watership Down. With Hazel at the helm, followed by Fiver, Blackberry, Silver, and all the bloody rest. Brave and battered through their conflict with General Woundwort and his own militia of bunnies. Kehaar, the black-headed seagull who befriended the warrior Bigwig most of all, swooped and squawked.

Like some prized collector, Harper treasured how picturesque they were. There were other posters.

They canvased the room like wallpaper. There were ones about movies she saw with her sisters in the family-owned cinema at the heart of their English town, mythological beasts, and heroic legends.

So many more about stories she read and books her mother read to her before bed. The ones written by Muggles and the ones written by wizards and witches alike. Some moved. Some remained still.

Funnily enough, the posters that stood stationary were her most beloved out of the entire collection.

It always amused Harper, how she lived in this world filled with magic and wonder beyond her own comprehension at times, and the books that almost always captivated her in the end were written by non-magical people. Tolkien. Pullman. Adams. They never saw a shred of actual magic.

Yet they envisioned the worlds they created and the characters that occupied them so effortlessly.

It was as if they knew the magic was there all along, even if they couldn’t see it. Couldn’t grasp it. All inside their minds. Imagination, in her opinion, was the greatest magic of all. For one reason.

Everyone in the world could have it.

Harper was a reader. She devoured words. Indoors with a blanket and iced punch. Outdoors laying upon grassy hills. Some days, if she felt adventurous, she would make her home atop the branch of some tree. She thought of the books she loved. Ones she connected with and day-dreamed about.

There was something about the Muggle stories that seemed so different from the Wizarding World literature she delved into. It always fascinated her about how people, who never experienced their world, made up such tales of valor and wonder. How could a Muggleborn who never fought a dragon write about fighting a dragon? How could they find the words and make them sound right?

Witches and wizards were different. They witnessed epic things firsthand and they’d tell the truth. But non-magical people would spin the truth in circles. They, like magical people, could be gifted liars.

And that, to her, would always be endearing.

It was one of the reasons why Harper respected them all so much. Not just because her father was one and she loved him very, very much along with her mother and both her sisters. But because they could be just as reckless as magical people. Muggleborns could be just as frustrating as them.

Just as foolish and kind. Just as brave and strong and good. Harper knew that now more than ever.

She was half-Muggle too.

Same as Roma and Bree. But that undeniable truth came with its own fair share of prejudice-driven issues. The kind that came to them in nasty whispers, mean looks, and several unjustifiable actions.

Even so, the McIntyre girls were proud of their heritage. Her older sisters were fiercely protective about the nature of their blood and the truth of their father. But not as defensive as Cooper got whenever her family came under fire. She scowled back at the scowlers who looked down on her husband, her children. Whenever Cooper was with her family, she wore the face of stern, loving mother and wife. But outside of that, the woman was just as fierce and fiery as her oldest daughters.

Which was why whenever the term ‘Mudblood’ was thrown around so carelessly back when Roma and Bree attended Hogwarts, they got into many an altercation. Whether the insult came from either boy or girl, Hufflepuff or Slytherin, Gryffindor or Ravenclaw, the result was almost always the same: bloody noses, hexes and jinxes thrown every which way. Detentions for everyone there.

Harper lost count of how many times her mother had to leave for Hogwarts in the past and unravel whatever messes her oldest daughters got themselves into. The number of their fights and duels were staggering. They only increased when Roma’s best friend Charmaine “Charlie” Diyoza fought alongside them. Whenever Roma got herself into a fight, Charlie was right there beside her.

Her mother would nod as Headmistress McGonagall scolded them all and had promised harsh consequences when they returned home. But Cooper never did that. She’d briefly take them home.

But then cooked them all a delicious meal. There’d be no talking beforehand, only after they ate. When she embraced Roma, Charlie, and Bree: high fiving them afterwards. She told them that she was proud. Proud of them all.

Another flash of light briefly brightened up her bedroom.

Harper scanned every corner and inch of it. She looked to the enormous, ornate desk her father constructed for her out of cherry wood. She adored the sailboat engravings he carved into the wood for dramatic flair. When Nyko McIntyre wasn’t off with his fellow lumberjacks, cutting down trees, he practiced carpentry on the side. Her father had handmade all the furniture in their home.

Furniture in her bedroom, same as her sister’s lodgings and the quarters Da’ shared with Ma’.

There was an armoire he designed. The fancy wardrobe had clouds etched into its oaken hull. Her father, upon hearing her many pleas, added birds flying around them. Some were big. Some small.

He had forced an enormous mirror onto the trestle of a horizontal cabinet with countless drawers. The wooden flowers her Da’ cut up onto its sides were artificial orchids, lavenders, and carnations.

Every piece of wood that had been felled and formed into something splendid had his mark on it.

And then it happened. The sound. Harper heard it coming from the hardwood floor beneath her.

The sound had a consistent tone. It was a snore. A low-sounding snore, but a snore, nonetheless.

Harper stretched her neck to see the culprit behind it all.

Fox was already outside of her saffron sleeping bag, her limbs seemed to be tangled up messily with her blankets. Her head was off her pillow and resting atop the indigo sleeping bag next to her.

The other girl was still tucked into that same sleeping bag, under the quilted covers, like a newborn baby fresh from the hospital ward. Zoe Monroe quietly slept on, undisturbed. She wasn’t snoring.

That noise belonged to Fox alone, who looked to be drooling as well, leaving a stain on her friend.

Harper shook her head and chuckled. No matter how much the two girls got on each other’s nerves, sometimes arguing and even jawing at one another about nonsense, they were unwittingly close.

Raven had told her once that they were stuck with two sides of the same coin. Only the coin was chaos and it would be up to the two of them to keep the other two in line. Which was why Raven had gifted them both enchanted clockwork hummingbirds that flew around when wound up tight.

Fox and Monroe, goofballs that they were, poured over their Christmas presents way back when.

Both girls loved their gifts of Metallurgy, which made the presents they presented to Raven, a Pygmy Puff sweater from Fox and Monroe’s Niffler plush doll, pale in comparison. They showed off their clockwork hummingbirds whenever they could and bragged about how their friend made them. When they were at their grassy knoll back in Hogwarts, they’d do tricks with the machines.

They were marvels worthy of the steampunk name. Raven was always off in her workshop next to Ravenclaw Tower, inventing such things in that abandoned classroom of hers, always noisily busy. The spyglass Harper had been gifted, the one that bent her point of view, laid on the bedside table.

She had turned in her bed to look at the Ravenclaw girl sleeping next to her, breathing ever slowly.

Her friends had trickled into her home one at a time over the course of the week.

Raven arrived first on Monday afternoon. She took a Portkey to the McIntyre farm with Professor Jacapo Sinclair, one of the few adults who watched over her during the summer months in Hogwarts. He was the closest thing Raven had to family. Harper knew that because the Ravenclaw had told her in secret. The girls embraced as Sinclair accepted a cup of peach tea from her parents.

“Welcome back!” Harper exclaimed. She noticed something shiny on the girl’s forehead. “You brought your goggles!” Her glasses went askew during their hug, so she fixed them. “What’s that?”

Raven grinned at her. She adjusted her Metallurgy goggles so that both lenses started glowing sapphire and turned over the smooth piece of rock she brought with her from Hogwarts. The Ravenclaw girl pulled the specs over her eyes so the thing that was emitting brightness revealed several strands of astral projected light. They encompassed the rock like a net and leaked outward.

“The heart of a fallen star.” Raven explained to Harper. She then turned the stone over so that the astral light moved around slowly. The Ravenclaw girl then placed the rock into the Gryffindor girl’s hand: “Your turn.” Harper began timidly shaking her head, but Raven insisted. “It’s okay.”

“It feels cool.” Harper murmured, looking entirely astonished by the sight. “Where’d you get it?”

“I’ve always had it.” Raven answered. “It’s the same kind of substance that my wand is made of.”

“Metallic meteorite.” Harper smiled. “The first of its kind.” She rotated it again. “Maybe the last.”

“The wandmaker let me have that.” The Reyes girl stated. “He told me that it'd spoken my name.”

“Your name?” The McIntyre girl’s emerald pupils widened, large as gems: “How is that possible?”

“I’ve got a way with metal.” Raven smirked. “That’s what he said when he handed it over to me.”

“What are you planning to do with this space rock?” Harper asked as she handed it back to Raven.

“I’m going to make it into something.” Raven sounded more solemn than an Unbreakable Vow.

“Merlin’s beard.” The chestnut-haired girl had whispered: “Are you serious?”

“It won’t be easy.” The raven-haired girl muttered back: “But that’s the plan.”

Both girls began trading words back and worth. So much so that they became one big talking mass.

“It does look like the right kind of material.”

“I will need to break that down all at once.”

“That’s never been any kind of problem for you.”

“Only if I get the welding temperature correct.”

“You’d need to start some kind of fire.”

“The hottest kind. The brightest kind.”

“Don’t forget your runes.”

“Those will be the best part.”

“What kinds will you carve into the metal?”

“I haven’t decided yet. But when I do-”

“-you’ll need an assistant to help you?”

“Correct.”

“It would be my pleasure.”

“Excellent.”

“Scalpels and whetstones?”

“From dusk till dawn.”

“Can I bring Fox and Monroe?”

“If you must.”

“They behave better when there’s food.”

“Here we go again-”

“Don’t you start!”

“I am starting!”

“I brought all of the snacks the last time around!”

“Only because I covered you the last four times!”

“But I always feed those two the most!”

“And who has to clean up after them?”

“Both of us!”

“Oh yeah? Who has to take them out?”

“I do!”

“Lies!”

“Are you calling me a liar?!”

“Maybe I am!”

“Raven!” Sinclair called. He had already started walking away and waving farewell. “Have fun!”

“This discussion is far from over!” Raven wagged a finger at Harper. She began sprinting as the Head of Ravenclaw House made his way towards the railroad spike Portkey. The Hispanic girl rammed into him, sinking her face into his belly. She hugged her guardian, wishing him goodbye.

Zoe Monroe came on Tuesday. Only her arrival had been late at night. Harper woke up when she heard noises coming from downstairs since her door had been left wide open. She put on her glasses and crept out of bed, neglecting to wake up Raven because she looked so peaceful sleeping.

Then she went down the hall, towards the stairs. Harper made her way down, tip-toeing every step.

“Mum, you can go now!” Monroe’s voice called out from the kitchen. Harper heard someone protesting and a shuffle of movement, of feet moving across the floor. “You’re embarrassing me!”

When Harper rounded the corner and stuck her face out to peek on what was happening, she saw her mother, Cooper McIntyre, in olive green pajamas with a woolen shawl wrapped around her shoulders, stifling a smile. Zoe Monroe, with a face red as tomato paste, was gently pushing an adult caricature of herself closer and closer towards the door. Her mother sputtered out some more.

“Don’t forget to take your vitamins.” Sienna Monroe lectured: “Scrub behind your ears with soap.”

“I already told you I would.” Zoe hissed hurriedly to her, her eyes shifted to Cooper and then widened at the sight of an eavesdropping Harper: “Alright, I understand. You can go home now.”

“You must remember to call me if anything happens.” Sienna said. Zoe’s jaw dropped. She shut her eyes, trying to push her back. Her mum turned to Cooper: “You will let me know, won’t you?”

“I have your number.” Cooper nodded whilst waving the piece of parchment she had given to her.

“Why did you write it down?” Zoe grunted, trying to move her mother. “I could’ve told her that!”

“Well you’re quite forgetful!”

“I am not!”

“There’s a reason why I got you a Remembrall for your birthday!”

“Don’t remind me!”

“She has a severe pollen allergy.” Sienna reminded Cooper. “Her nose gets awfully stuffy. So-”

“Oh my God!” Zoe let go of pushing her and gripped her cocoa hair in horror. She shook her head.

“Well I had to tell her that!” Sienna told her daughter. “If I didn’t, you’d go through all her tissues.”

“But you already gave me tissues!” Zoe groaned. “A whole box of them! I wish Dad brought me!”

“Your Dad has already met Mrs. McIntyre!” Sienna said. “I’d say it’s my turn, don’t you think?”

“By Dumbledore’s name!” The Monroe girl moaned. She covered her whole face with her hands.

“I packed your medicine in your bag.” Sienna uttered to Zoe. “That’s a priority. Your condition-”

“Mum, no!” Zoe cried, looking around anxiously. She shook her head violently at her mother as her eyes began to glisten. “Please don’t.” Her slim body trembled at the thought of them knowing.

For the first time that evening, Sienna Monroe held her tongue. She bent down and hugged her daughter tightly, rubbing her back again and again, whispering into her ear. Zoe nodded softly at whatever the woman was saying to her. Her mother kissed her on the forehead fiercely and waved.

At Zoe, Cooper, and even Harper. Then Sienna Monroe Apparated from their farmhouse kitchen.

Harper entered the kitchen after that and hugged the side of Cooper. Her mother looked startled that her youngest daughter was awake but returned the hug all the same. The two of them stared at Zoe, still red-faced and quiet after her mother finally left. It was a long silence that had followed.

“I’m sorry about that.” Zoe whispered to both Cooper and Harper. “I just get embarrassed easily.”

“That’s okay.” Harper responded. “I’m happy that you came.” She moved over to her friend and wrapped her arms around her, pulling her into a hug. “I’m so glad you’re here.” Harper whispered.

“Me too.” Zoe returned the hug, just as tight.

“Are you excited for the Final?” Harper asked.

Monroe nodded. So Harper laughed: “Me too.”

“We all are.” Cooper chimed in. “England hasn’t won this major tournament in years.” She moved towards the refrigerator and opened it. “The last time they even got this far was before my time.”

Harper looked at her mother and smiled. Cooper was breathtakingly beautiful, a fact that had passed on to her oldest daughters, Roma and Bree. The McIntyre woman had an athletically fit body and long chestnut-colored hair. Harper inherited that from her, as well as her green eyes too.

“Are you hungry, Zoe?” Cooper asked, biting her lower lip. It was another thing Harper got from her. “I know that you just returned from a big trip.” She took out some cheddar and chives. “Italy?”

“Florence.” Zoe responded to her. “I went with my Mum and Dad to visit family that I have there.”

Zoe saw Cooper taking out some eggs. When Cooper looked pointedly at her, she said: “Starving.”

“Sit down then.” Cooper smiled, showing off her cheek dimples. “I’ll knock something together.”

“Can I have some too?” Harper asked hopefully, biting her lower lip as well. “I’m your daughter.”

“Are you sure?” Her mother stuck her tongue out. “I seem to recall the storks mixing up my order.”

“Hey!” The skinny, bespectacled McIntyre exclaimed. Zoe laughed at them both. “I resent that.”

“You were supposed to be asleep.” Cooper shook at her. “Mind telling me why you’re up so late?”

Harper shrugged. “I wanted to see Zoe.” She turned and poked at her belly. “Do you speak Italian?”

While Cooper cooked up some omelets, stuffed thick with cheddar and chives, Zoe made her, and Harper laugh with many a translation. They took turns feeding English words to Zoe only for her to turn them into Italian.

By the time the food was done and all three of them set themselves up to eat, they heard footsteps.

“Something smells good.” Raven croaked, rubbing her eyes. Cooper and Harper shared their eggs with her. That was one of the best nights they experienced all summer, eating together like a family.

Early Thursday morning marked the coming of Fox. Way early, before the roosters let loose their awakening call. The coop they shared beside their chickens was nestled out back of McIntyre farm.

Harper woke up first, feeling a small weight close to her spot in bed. Fox was crouched over her, tying different colored, geometric shapes into Raven’s charcoal hair. The Ravenclaw girl was still asleep. The tiny Gryffindor’s back hunched while she worked, her lips frowned in concentration.

“You’re here.” Harper mumbled, blinking at Fox’s very suspicious actions. “What’re you doing?”

“Shhhh!” Fox’s eyes bulged out of her skull when she realized that she was discovered. She put an index finger to her own lips, further emphasizing the need for discretion. She hissed: “It’s a prank!”

Harper rubbed at her eyes, leaning up and looking at the zip lock bag half-filled with red cubes, blue spheres, green cones, and yellow pyramids, in between both the small Gryffindor girl’s knees.

“What are those?” She whispered, pointing at the three-dimensional shapes Fox tied onto Raven.

The diminutive girl beamed, inching towards her, and suppressed several quiet ‘ppfftt’ giggles. Fox showed Harper each of the shapes from her bag. The red cube glowed crimson, when she shook it, emitting the crackling sound of a fire, while the blue sphere lit up azure, with the sound of ocean waves. Fox placed a green cone into the palm of Harper’s hand who squeezed it so that it gleamed jade, its sound shifted like the earthen floor of an old forest. When Fox handed Harper the yellow pyramid next, she shook it softly so that it shined golden and howled like desert winds.

“I got these from Weasleys' Wizard Wheezes in Diagon Alley.” Fox explained quietly to Harper.

Harper suddenly realized the implications of what she was saying and patted the top of her head, trying to find out if Fox had done the same to her chestnut hair. Fox shook her head, telling her quietly: “I was planning to do you last.” The little girl shrugged at the sight of Harper’s outrage: “I already did Zoe by the way.” Fox gestured to the sleeping Ravenclaw. “Do you want in on this?”

The McIntyre girl chewed on her lower lip, alternating stares between her fellow Gryffindor and the vulnerable Raven, before whispering: “Let me put on my glasses.” She scrambled to get them.

Both girls worked together in the darkness, whispering and giggling every time they successfully tied a shape into the strands of raven hair on Raven’s head. “Who brought you?” Harper inquired.

“My grandparents.” Fox weaved a sphere and pyramid back to back onto Raven’s scalp. “Your Dad was the one who greeted us.” She passed a cube and cone over to Harper. “He’s really big.”

“Enormous.” Harper agreed, nodding. She knotted together the shapes given to her. “Like a bear.”

“More like a tree.” Fox calculated in her head. “When I first met him, I went looking for apples.”

“You’re crazy about apples, aren’t you?”

“Obsessed.”

“Zoe mentioned that.”

“She would.”

“You’re welcome to the other guest room if you want.”

“Thanks. They both look like quite the fancy set-ups.”

“This is harder than it looks.”

“Right? I’m sweating over here.”

“My fingers won’t stop shaking.”

“These bloody things nearly slipped from my palm the first time around.”

“How the heck did you even tie them onto Zoe without her waking up?”

“Chalk it up to two whole semesters in a bed next to hers.”

“Did you do these kinds of things often?”

“All the time. My methods have grown.”

“You never did this to me though.”

“I never really knew you until now.”

“Thank you.”

“You’re welcome.”

Raven snorted out a grumble and shifted her body around. Harper and Fox froze while she did all this, covering their mouths so that their breathing, and snickering wouldn’t give themselves away. When it seemed like she was beginning to stir, Harper covered her ears and Fox hid her eyes away with her forearm. Seconds passed or had it been minutes? It was hard to tell so they snuck a peek.

She was still asleep. They had not yet been discovered! Harper and Fox lightly high-fived each other before returning to their work, finishing up the remaining few shapes in Fox’s zip lock bag.

The pair of them snuck out of bed to check on the guest room where Zoe slept. The Monroe girl had yet to stir awake as well. She was still bundled up with the blankets her mother provided her.

“So what’s the plan now?” Harper asked.

“We wait.” Fox answered. “Till they wake.”

“Aren’t you tired? You should sleep.”

“And miss all the fun? Not a chance.”

“Why is your whole body shaking?”

“I don’t know! Maybe I’m wired up.”

“What do you want to do then?”

“Do you have Exploding Snap?”

So that was what they did downstairs, on the marble island in the middle of the McIntyre kitchen, while a wide awake Nyko cooked up those sizzling sausages that his youngest daughter loved. And by the time the three of them feasted on those fatty logs of meat, and Harper and Fox showed Nyko McIntyre how to properly build a fifth castle of cards, the sound effects of fire, water, earth, and wind echoed all at once several times over. Both Harper and Fox doubled over with laughter.

“What the heck are these?!” Raven Reyes yapped out of the blue. “Why’re they making noise?!”

“You too?!” Zoe Monroe called back over to her. “Galloping gargoyles, they’re tied into our hair!”

“Why are these things lighting up so bright? I can’t see!”

“I already know who did this! Fox! Get up here and help!”

Then it had been Friday. And the two guest bedrooms that Cooper McIntyre had organized for her daughter’s friends, during the remainder of their stay with them, were available because they’d now insisted on sharing space in Harper’s room. Particularly on the ground below her bed. That struck a chord inside Harper, who shook her head at them when they unveiled their sleeping bags.

“You won’t like being crowded here.” Harper had protested. “It gets claustrophobic.” She wrung her hands together nervously and shifted her body from side to side. “You are going to hate this.”

She was fine with Raven sharing her bed, she liked having her best friend close. But Harper didn’t like the idea of her other two closest friends having to sleep in an uncomfortable spot like the floor.

“That’s the point of sleepovers.” Zoe Monroe said patiently. “We’re supposed to be packed together.” She stacked together Nutter Butters into a tower. When she added one more, it collapsed.

“Louk soudinez!” Fox chimed in through a mouthful of gummy bears. When she saw how confused they looked, she swallowed and then repeated herself a bit more clearly: “Like sardines.”

“They’ve been inside your room already.” Raven told her. She dug her hand around a package of Oreos and pulled one apart, eating one half. “They know what sorts of things to expect over here.”

They were sitting around each other on the different colored beanie bag chairs that Harper dragged into an alcove within her room. Packages of snacks and fizzy drinks were littered all around them.

“That’s not the point.” Harper said quietly. “The guest rooms have more space and beds for them.”

“Beds are overrated.” Monroe responded. “Besides, how else are we supposed to gossip together?”

“Don’t worry.” Raven reassured Harper: “It’ll be a good time.” She gave a thumbs up: “You’ll see.”

“These Muggle treats are delicious by the way.” Fox rolled around on the throw rug beneath them with red and orange colored patterns. She munched on Nutter Butters and Oreos alike. “Mmmmh!”

The other three girls watched their remaining companion giggle maniacally, rolling around repeatedly while continually wolfing down assorted sweets. Monroe pinched the bridge of her nose.

It took the McIntyre girl a good long while to shake out of it in order to voice more of her concerns.

“You would be sleeping on the floor.” Harper referred to Fox and Monroe. “Your backs will hurt.”

“The sleeping bags will fix that.” Monroe replied. “And Fox is no stranger to laying on the floor.”

“Oh my God!” Fox reddened and then began stomping: “That was one time! One bloody time!”

“Are you referring to the infamous Gryffindor Girl Domino?” Raven laughed. “That’s a classic.”

“She rolled off her bed during the night.” Monroe began.

“And then stayed asleep until morning.” Raven continued.

Both their voices worked in synch, going back and forth. Fox turned redder and redder at the two.

“The girls woke up one by one.”

“Then started moving forward.”

“Ever so slowly, slowly, slowly.”

“And tripped over the little Fox.”

“I don’t remember. Was it a nice fox or a mean fox?”

“Are you sure it was even a fox and not some box?”

“Cut it out!” Fox whined to them both. “You better stop!” Her mouth went agape when they didn’t.

“It could’ve been an ox or the nasty chicken pox.”

“I was so sure that it’d been a pair of gym socks.”

“Nope, t’was a bagel with cream cheese and lox.”

Monroe guffawed. Raven chortled. Both covered their mouths as they chuckled at their tiny friend. Then they composed themselves and started again. Fox’s jaw dropped further as they’d continued.

“One girl fell into another girl.”

“And then another and another.”

“And another and then another.”

“Until they were all.”

“Flat on the ground!”

“That wasn’t my fault!” Fox balled her hands into fists, her body trembled. “I didn’t know I fell!”

Monroe and Raven were cackling louder and louder. They grappled each other and then fell back.

“It’s not funny!” The wee Gryffindor said hotly at the two. “One girl had to go the hospital wing!”

Their laughter grew in volume. Louder and louder, wilder and more whimsical than ever before.

Fox’s cheeks blushed crimson. Her small body quivered at their crumpled forms and she gave up.

“Harper!” The little girl tattled to her friend. “Make them stop! I didn’t mean for that to happen!”

Only Harper looked to be deep in concentration, lost in a sea of her own thoughts. She mumbled quietly: “I still think it’s a bad idea.” It looked like she was trying to persuade the air around her. Both Raven and Monroe stopped laughing. Fox got over her humiliation and showed her concern.

The three of them stared at their host, this bespectacled girl with a nest of tangled up chestnut hair as wild as the woods surrounding the McIntyre property. They watched her bite her lower lip. Which she always did whenever she was mulling something over in her mind several times over.

“Harper?” Raven asked quietly. She waved a hand in front of her face and when she didn’t react to that, she poked at her shoulder gently. Harper’s green eyes drifted to Raven: “Stop worrying.”

She widened them, so that they were large as duck eggs, at the Ravenclaw.

“You think too much.” Fox chirped. “You should think less.” She scooted closer to her. “Like me.”

“Absolutely not.” Zoe Monroe scoffed. “One Fox is bad enough.” She shook her head at the other girl. “Two Foxes would be insane.” Monroe shuddered at the possibility of having to deal with that.

That jape provoked little to no reaction from their friend.

Raven Reyes studied Harper McIntyre for a good long minute before sighing and shaking her head. She crawled over towards her and gently grabbed those thick glasses of hers and pulled them off.

Harper yelped at the sudden intrusion of her personal space and squinted questioningly at Raven.

“I know what’s wrong.” Raven declared and then set down Harper’s thick glasses atop the adjacent desk. “I’ve seen this puzzle before.” She took a nearby fluffy cushion. “And I have the solution.”

The three other girls stared at the Ravenclaw as she began rolling up her sleeves. Seconds passed by like the grains of sand in an hourglass. And then Raven brought the cushion down on Harper’s head. The McIntyre girl squealed out of surprise before another large blow pushed her on her back.

When Harper struggled to get back up, Raven put her butt down with another blow of her cushion.

Zoe cupped her hands around her mouth and called: “Get wrecked!”

“Tyrannosaurus-wrecked!” Fox hollered out loud as if by speaker.

The two of them looked and pointed at each other excitedly before the floodgates burst all at once.

Fox and Monroe burst out laughing. They howled with it before going for the pillows of Harper’s bed, hooting as they went. By the time Harper got back on her feet, her fellow Gryffindors had already overrun the lone Ravenclaw, hitting her with their pillows, which rose and fell like swords.

Harper managed to get her own fat and fluffy pillow, the one with cartoon penguins and seals, and then hamstrung Monroe. When Fox turned to see what happened, she knocked her flat on her back.

The girls laughed themselves silly as they began belting each other with pillows. Their throats turned hoarse from all their laughter, so much that they’d started keeling over, turning red from it.

And that was it. That was the end of the awkwardness and the nervousness that Harper felt. The nonsensical fear that the friends she worked so hard to make would abandon her if they weren’t satisfied. She’d grown terrified, as if the littlest thing would drive them away, leaving her all alone.

Harper realized the truth as she struck her friends and had pillows strike her back: they wouldn’t.

All four of them stayed up late that same night, telling spooky ghost stories by flashlight and cramming their mouths full of candies, chips, and cookies. They even enchanted some of Harper’s old stuffed animals into wrestling one another and charmed origami figurines they folded into moving on their own. Paper cranes flew around them while papyrus tigers pounced on each other.

There was a time when Harper couldn’t imagine herself having friends, couldn’t picture it. She was never the social type; she was the wallflower in the room. That one shy, quiet, awkward girl.

She didn’t know how to act around others during social situations. She had been the one who shuffled on her feet and whose eyes always seemed glued onto the floor. Harper had been hopeless.

So much so that she thought that she was going to remain lonely until the years went by and Hogwarts would be nothing but a memory. A sad and unfulfilled memento of a time she’d wasted.

But her friends changed all of that. They saw her for who she was. They gambled on knowing her.

And Harper felt like she earned them with the way she pursued conversations with them and helped them with difficult tasks if they asked. But it became clearer and clearer with every day that passed in and out of Hogwarts, that none of it would’ve come to pass if she hadn’t had help. A small push.

Harper would’ve never gathered the necessary confidence it had taken to pursue them if not for Bellamy and Roan. The boys who befriended her when she had pushed everyone away. Everyone.

If it weren’t for them, none of this would’ve been possible. She taught them magic and they taught her how to be okay with who she was. How not to care about what other people thought about her.

And she’d always be grateful to them both. Her boys. The ones before Nathan, Monty, and Jasper.

They would all be coming, late in the afternoon, closer towards Saturday evening for the last game.

This week-long sleepover was something they’d all been planning ever since their first year ended. Everyone knew about the oncoming Quidditch World Cup tournament over summer break. Knew the dates and the matches that fit them ahead of time. It was always the plan for them to watch it.

All of them together.

Especially the Final. That was a different beast altogether. Because now they were in it as a country. And considering how phenomenal the sport was in the Wizarding World, it was so iconic that their homeland of Great Britain was one of the last two countries remaining.

Harper was ecstatic when her mother announced that she would be organizing the viewing party for the England vs Germany match on McIntyre farm. The projector would be set up so that the match played on the side of their barn. Her friends would be able to arrive and watch at their place.

It would be the first time all five boys came to visit. Bellamy and Roan were finally coming here.

There would be picnic tables full of her mother’s homecooked food, some of her signature dishes and desserts. Her oldest sisters Roma and Bree would be returning as well to watch it along with Charlie. Even her father, with what little knowledge he had about the magical world, was firing up the grill for some barbecued goodness. He enjoyed watching Quidditch as well, said it reminded him of home.

He meant hockey of course. The Canadian-born Muggle had always educated his girls on the sport. Nyko McIntyre had made it a priority to take his daughters skating whenever the ice froze nearby.

It didn’t matter that Quidditch was played on flying brooms. A contact sport was a contact sport.

Another deep rumble snapped Harper out of her recollections. Here she was nestled in bed, reminiscing about the past while a thunderstorm raged outside her home. She shifted out of bed and pushed her woolen sock-covered feet into her bunny slippers, the ones that squeaked with every step. Harper wrapped her favorite blanket, a woven portrait of a phoenix rising from the ashes, around her skinny frame. She slid atop the hardwood floor, bit by bit, and inches by inches.

Harper did all this quietly of course, choosing to let the covers remain on her bed as not to disturb the sleeping Raven. She tip-toed around a silent Zoe and a snoring Fox, making her way across the room towards the red door that led outside. She opened the door to escape, leaving all her friends sleeping soundly in the room behind her, and left. The letters H-A-R-P-E-R were nailed on back alongside a pirate flag of skull crossbones with the words: ‘AVAST YE SCURVY DOGS!’

The rain continued to fall outside. Its downpour had sounded like a lake or a river emptying itself.

She saw her sister’s rooms adjacent to her, with a blue door for R-O-M-A and a yellow door for B-R-E-E. Harper heard the snoozing of Charlie sleeping from one of the guest rooms she occupied.

Pictures of family vacations and camping trips hung in the dark and quiet hallway that she walked. There was a frame showing her and her sisters holding a large salmon they caught in Nova Scotia whilst fishing with their Da’. Another one exposed her Ma’ holding her daughters as a wave of Aruba seawater crashed into them. The clear, cerulean water covered them along with the white sand.

As the bespectacled, skinny girl made her way down the staircase of her family’s farmhouse, she noticed that the light in the kitchen was on. She tip-toed towards it like a thief avoiding capture.

Harper found her Ma’ sitting at the kitchen table with a steaming porcelain cat-shaped mug of coffee, with ears for handles, in her hands and the news section of the Wizarding World newspaper splayed in front of her. Her Da’ accompanied her. Cooper’s legs were stretched across Nyko’s lap as he held a block of wood and a Bowie knife, which he used to carve off wooden strips into the wastebasket nearby. His dog-shaped mug, with the snout out front, was filled with his own brew.

Her mother looked up to find her standing there with those squeaky rabbit slippers and her jaw dropped at the sight of her youngest daughter. She nudged her husband, who had been humming a soft tune while he transformed the wood into a small sculpture. It was a hobby he loved doing. His grey eyes widened. Cooper set her coffee, with lots of cream and sugar, atop the table and frowned.

“What are you doing up, Sweetie?” Her mother questioned her in a low whisper. Harper shrugged.

“Go back to sleep, Harp.” Her father gently urged his little girl. “This is too early, even for you.”

“You’re both awake.” The youngest McIntyre countered quietly. She crossed her arms over her chest, tightening the phoenix blanket over her shoulders, and stared pointedly at both her parents.

“But that’s because-” Nyko searched for words a capable father would make: “-we’re grown-ups.”

“Well spotted, darling.” Cooper had pinched at her husband’s sculpted biceps: “She’s not blind.”

“What was I supposed to say?”

“How the storm woke us both.”

“It woke me up too.” Harper walked towards the kitchen sink and stood up on her tippy toes, staring out the window. “There’s a lot.” She turned back to her parents: “Do you think it’ll stop?”

“Not any time soon.” Nyko pulled out his iPhone and swiped through the weather app for the status of that day: “It says here that it’ll stop high noon at the latest.” He set the device flat on their table.

“That could be wrong.”

“Or this could be right.”

“The weatherman always lies about those things.”

“This isn’t the weatherman, Harper. It’s the Internet.”

“Last winter they said there’d be a ton of blizzards and we only got the one.”

“You’re right about that. But that was winter. Now it’s summertime.”

“But the ground.” She chewed her bottom lip and shifted both her feet anxiously: “All the tables.”

“They’ll be completely drenched.” Her father shut an eye, moving his head left to right: “Soaked.”

“If we could set up that large tent out back-” She had stammered hopelessly: “-maybe that’ll help.”

“Not a chance!” The rumble of his laugh reverberated through his chest: “The rain will shred it!”

“What about the barn?” Harper began tearing up: “Will we still be able to watch on the side of it?”

“I doubt it-” Nyko yelped when Cooper pinched at his side: “Ouch, that one hurt! What’re you-”

The mother had been staring at her daughter the whole time, studying her facial features and her body’s actions. When she got her husband’s attention, she raised her eyebrows at him and gestured to Harper with a side-nod of her head. He observed his wife’s expression, as if it was one gigantic mathematical anomaly that needed to be solved. When it all clicked in his mind, his grey eyes widened larger than before.

Both the Bowie knife and wooden block slipped from his fingers, toppling on the tabletop surface.

“Ooooo-” Her father’s mouth turned into an ‘O” as he elongated the letter’s sound. “-oooooh fuck.”

“Nyko!” Cooper’s jaw dropped even further when he said that.

“Damn!” The tall, broad-shouldered man slapped a hand on his head. “Shit!” He covered his mouth.

“Swear jar!” Harper pointed: “Da’ you said a Muggle curse!” She held up two fingers. “Plus two!”

Nyko squirmed away from Cooper’s jabs: “I’m sorry, love.” He caught her hand, kissed it, and fished three shillings from his pants to put them all in the glass jar next to the windowsill: “Sorry.”

Ever since Roma and Bree returned, the contents of that jar had doubled in size, leading to many a scolding from Cooper about having to watch themselves around Harper. It tripled once Charlie arrived.

Her father sheathed his Bowie knife, left the half-carved sculpture, which started to resemble an alligator, on the table, slightly pushed her mother’s legs off his lap, and moved to grab Harper, lifting her up high in the air. His daughter squealed with delight and laughed aloud as he twirled her around before depositing her in his spot, next to Cooper. He seized the newspaper’s comic section and placed it in front of her.

“The rain will stop.” Her Da’ kissed the top of her head. “If it doesn’t, your Ma’ will use magic.”

Nyko gave his wife a big thumbs up and a confident nod, as if he’d fixed everything wrong that just happened. Her mother covered her eyes, shaking her head. He left, them both there, chuckling into his coffee.

“Don’t say that in Hogwarts.” Cooper whispered, mortified at what she just overheard. “Okay?”

“I won’t.” The youngest McIntyre girl promised. It was partly a lie; she already knew all the curses.

“That should only be a last resort.”

“I know.”

“Only use the swear: ‘float’.”

“The Wizarding World f-word.”

“That way, people will know who they’re messing with.”

“I understand.”

“Right.”

“Charlie calls that the magic f-bomb.”

“She’s more sensible than your sisters.”

They sat side by side, Cooper sipped coffee, reading the Wizarding news, while her daughter read the magically moving funnies.

“Is Da’ right?” Harper rounded on her mother, shifting her body on the chair so that she stood on her knees. “Can you make the rain stop with magic?” She tapped her arm. “You’ll dry everything?”

“It’s a bit more complicated than that.” Cooper turned to her youngest daughter. “But there are a couple of spells we can do in order make watching the Quidditch World Cup Final more bearable.”

“I hope so.” Harper whispered, sitting back and hugging her knees. “I hope we can do it outside.”

“Is there any particular reason why you want us to watch it outdoors?” Her mother brushed a tangled-up piece of chestnut hair from her daughter’s face and straightened her glasses, slightly askew.

“It’s the first time the boys will be visiting.” The youngest McIntyre muttered into her knees, avoiding her mother’s green eyes, same as hers, and turning to rest her cheek on her curled-up thighs.

“They can watch the Final just as easily inside our house.” Cooper replied. “We can set it up here.”

“It won’t be the same.”

“Why not?”

“Because nothing beats our farm at night.”

“Care to explain?”

“It’ll take too long to say.”

“We’ve got time.”

“I want to show them around.”

“There will be time for that.”

“Will there?”

“They’re staying until Sunday. Charlie shares Roma’s bed. The boys will take both guest rooms.”

“Is that alright with you?”

“Of course. Do you know how many friends your sisters used to bring on over back in the day?”

“I don’t know.”

“Trust me, this is no trouble.”

“Raven, Fox, and Zoe will be in my room.”

“Exactly. There’s plenty of space to go around.”

“I’m afraid.”

“Of what?”

“That there still won’t be enough time.”

“What do you mean?”

“They need to see the stars shining in the night sky because there isn’t a lamppost for miles.” Harper gushed; the words poured from her mouth like rain. “So they see the whole wide moon.”

Cooper smiled as her baby girl continued to unleash everything she’d been saving up for so long, stumbling through her sentences. She quietly watched as Harper continued to speak uninterrupted.

“They need so see everything I’ve already shown Raven, Fox, and Zoe. I need to catch them up.”

“I’ll have them stand on our porch to look out at all our fields and see the magical crops you keep.”

“Then they’ll be able to watch our animals grazing. They’ll see all our cows, chickens, and sheep.”

“I told Nate about that stream Da’ used to take me to practice fishing. I caught my first trout there.”

“Monty asked me if we kept mandrakes and I told him we did. I need to show him your garden.”

“And Jasper won’t stop pestering me about the tire swing Fox bragged about. I said I’d show him.”

“I’d promised Roan that I would show him the pond that freezes over in the winter. The same one that Da’ takes Roma, Bree, Charlie, and me to play a few rounds of pond hockey. I promised him.”

“I want to show Bellamy the fireflies at night. I want to show him how they’re so many that they flicker on and off like light switches over the grass around our home. I want him to see all of it.”

Harper finished her long-winded stretch of dialogue. She began taking deep gulps of air because she’d been left breathless afterward. The McIntyre girl held her chest while she blushed furiously.

Cooper pressed her hand into Harper’s back, helping her take in air repeatedly. Her mother’s smile was shaped like a crescent moon, the pearly whites of her teeth acted the part of a moonlight glow.

“I’m so happy.” Cooper pressed her lips to the top of Harper’s head, the same place where Nyko had kissed her: “That you’re happy.” Her mother whispered: “Happiness suits you. You wear it well.”

“They’re my friends.” Harper whispered back to Cooper. “All of them are finally going to be here.”

“I understand.”

“I need them to see.”

“If you don’t get through your whole list, there’s no reason to panic. They can come here again.”

“I know.”

“Good.”

“I owe them all so much.”

“They owe you too.” Cooper reiterated. She held her daughter’s face to look at her. “Remember?”

Harper nodded at her. She remembered her Ma’ lecturing her on how Harper was amazing herself.

“Never forget: they deserve you just as much as you deserve them.” Cooper said. “Never forget.”

“I won’t.” The youngest McIntyre girl whispered to her mother. They held onto each other tight.

“I’m so proud of you, Harp.”

“Thank you, Ma’.”

“Do you still remember our deal?”

Harper froze amidst her mother’s arms. She felt both her lips quivering, so she latched her front teeth onto the bottom one in order to steady herself. When Cooper didn’t hear her answer, she turned her around so that her face looked at her. The mother combed her youngest daughter’s twisted-up mess of chestnut hair, running her fingers through it all, attempting to tame its wildness.

“Sweetie.” Cooper’s emerald eyes were now glistening with tears of her own. Her voice turned fragile, its croak threatened to shatter her resolve into a hundred pieces. “Harper.” She repeated to her daughter: “The deal?”

Harper sniffled loudly. The tears fell from her own two green eyes in rivets. She shook her head.

“That can’t ever happen.” Cooper whispered fiercely to her youngest daughter. “Not ever again.”

“I’m okay now.” Harper sobbed to her mother. She tried to avoid her gaze but to no avail: “I am.”

“If anyone even THINKS about hurting you.” Cooper snarled angrily. “If they so much as fucking TOUCH you.” She shook her daughter’s shoulders as to get her seriousness across. “Sweetie-”

“Ma’-” Harper attempted to say: “-you cursed.” But Cooper wasn’t having it, not this time around.

“You have to tell us.” Her mother wiped her own eyes. “You have to let us know.” She wiped Harper’s cheeks: “You write to Roma. Bree. Charlie. Da’.” They continued crying together: “Me.”

“Headmistress McGonagall said-”

“She won’t always be around to help. The prefects and Professors won’t always be around to help.”

“The assembly-”

“Aye, there was a speech! The Headmistress talked to all four Houses: some listened, some won’t!”

“But Ma’-”

“You talk to me!” Cooper snapped; her green eyes shimmered like the serpent of Slytherin. Almost as if the viper lived within her; it was the angriest Harper had seen of her in a long time: “Tell me!”

The way her mother shook her while speaking spoke volumes on the seriousness of the matter. Harper swallowed the sob that would’ve escaped her mouth. Then she nodded her head at Cooper.

“Say it.”

“I promise.”

Mother and daughter embraced once more. They hugged each other until all their tears went away.

“It hurts us all when you’re hurting.” Cooper whispered; her voice deathly quiet. “And you don’t speak up.” She rubbed her hand in circles around the littlest McIntyre’s back. “It breaks my heart.”

“I’m sorry, Ma’.” Harper whispered back. “I’m so sorry.” She leaned into her. “I just didn’t want to be a bother to anyone.” Harper curled up onto her lap and wrapped her arms around her neck.

“You could never be a bother, Sweetie.” Cooper murmured. “You’re the best thing that’s ever happened to me.” She buried her nose into her daughter’s hair. “Roma, Bree, and you. Always.”

“They’re so much stronger than I am. So are Da’, Charlie, and you. You’re all so much stronger.”

“That isn’t true. Everyone is strong in different ways, Sweetie. It takes us a lifetime to find them.”

They stayed like that until the rain finally stopped outside. They looked out the window and saw the beginning of a beautiful dawn. The sun began rising, in all its reds and oranges and yellows. Streaks of black and blue laced the indigo clouds nearby, they began billowing outward in wisps.

“Oh, I almost forgot.” Cooper stood up from the kitchen table, carrying Harper and rocking her up and down, left to right. She opened a nearby drawer, rifling through debris to produce one shilling.

She dropped that very same shilling into the nearly full swear jar adjacent to the windowsill nearby.

“I want to be brave just like you, Ma’.” Harper said.

Cooper replied: “You are brave, Harp. You’re the bravest of us all.”

The sound of footfalls and footsteps could be heard upstairs, they echoed through the ceiling above them. Eventually, the sounds of Roma and Bree wrestling and arguing over who first touched the bathroom nob went underway. They were fighting, as usual, over who got to use the shower first. Charlie’s loud, authoritative voice rang out, as she tried to reign them both in, like she always did.

“Did you talk with your sisters?” Cooper asked her daughter.

“Yeah.” Harper answered her mother. She sighed softly: “I did.”

“I will teach you the rest when you are older. When you are ready.”

“I know, Ma’.” The youngest McIntyre whispered to Cooper: “I know.”

Then her friend’s voices began stirring up, one by one. First Raven, then Zoe, and then finally Fox.

“What the heck? Where did Harper go?”

“What’s going on? EW! Fox get off! Did you just floating drool all over me?! Get off! YUCK!”

“Why’d you have to push me? I would’ve gotten off if you asked! It’s not my fault! I didn’t know!”

Maybe they couldn’t see what the girls were doing, but they had a good idea what was happening.

And that was how that morning started, with the back and forth of her sisters’: “I touched it first” and “My fat, round ass you did!” and “Don’t you mean flat, skinny?” followed by an “OW!” Charmaine Diyoza held both of them back as, yet another scuffle ensued, she cried: “Cut it out!” Raven followed in her stead, attempting to pull Fox off Monroe, as the little girl jumped onto her. Fox screeched aloud: “Flying Turtle Slam!” and Zoe shrieked: “You give your moves the dumbest names!” and Raven huffed through all the exertion of keeping them apart: “Harper! I need your help!”

That was how her Saturday began.


	3. ...Inside This Coven Of Witches

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> ...as she prepares for a certain arrival. 
> 
> "Daylight" by Maroon 5

Harper McIntyre thought back to the weeks that had followed once her first year in school ended.

If Cooper McIntyre was furious over the injustices inflicted upon Harper throughout her first year, then all the fury exhibited by Roma and Bree, along with Charmaine “Charlie” Diyoza, was murderous. All three women fell into a hot-tempered, black rage over the revelation that the youngest McIntyre was bullied in Hogwarts and kept quiet about it, shouldering the burden alone.

It took her mother all she had to keep them from using Legilimency to ascertain the names of every Slytherin girl who had gone after Harper, especially when she refused to tell them when they pried.

Instead they talked quietly about the matter alone, far from the earshot reach of Harper McIntyre.

And then, after several hours in a locked room together, they emerged and put their plan to motion.

The young women approached Harper separately. Charmaine had been the first. She was the one who initiated the training regime. She showed her a couple of things. Like the basics to close-quarter combat. At first Harper didn’t want any part of it. She was always the one to avoid conflict in her family, the one who shied away from confrontation. But Charlie convinced her otherwise.

She had told Harper that it was Cooper who wanted her to know. It was her own mother’s orders.

“You won’t always have a wand on you.” Charlie told her firmly. “If someone disarms you, we want you ready to face it.” She held her face with both hands, at either side of her cheeks. “Okay?”

Harper bit her lower lip and looked down. When Charmaine raised her head back up, she nodded.

That was how lessons first began. They started with how to throw a proper punch. Charlie taught Harper how to move her feet and which direction to shift her whole body's weight when applying a haymaker. The two of them practiced in the forest around McIntyre farm, where they wouldn’t be disturbed.

Twenty-three-year-old Charmaine “Charlie” Diyoza held punching mitts while Harper McIntyre went after her. Her movements were clunky and clumsy at first, she messed up several times over.

But every failure was a lesson. Every bruise, that showed on her knuckles, made her a little bit better. Harper became winded when she first started, but Charlie helped her built up her stamina through many a long distance run in the early morning hours. 

Then Charlie taught Harper how to slither out of a chokehold, how to drive an elbow into the side of an opponent, twisting their arm sideways so that they released her completely in order for her to escape. This was something they had practiced repeatedly, just as many times as the punching.

They did this for weeks. Charlie dressed in yoga pants and a tank top, Harper in shorts and a thin t-shirt. They practiced fighting till they were both red-faced and covered in sweat. They kept at it.

“What if they disarm me.” Harper questioned her during all of it: “And they still have their wand?”

“Charge at them.” Charlie encouraged her. “The result is the same either way. Disarm them back.”

“And if they manage to get me with their magic?”

“Then you would’ve suffered a warrior’s defeat.”

“Oh.”

“Don’t worry. This kind of fighting is just in case. The others will teach you even more magic.”

Whenever they rested across each other on the dirt and gravel path that wrapped around the McIntyre property, deep in the woods. They drank from their canteens, laying back into the shade.

“They call this Muggle dueling.” Harper said to Charlie. She turned to her. “Wizards and witches.”

“Aye, it’s Muggle dueling.” Charlie smiled wolfishly at Harper: “But only fools would dismiss it.”

“Is this what they’re teaching you at the Academy? The place where you’re training at right now?”

“It’s mandatory. Members within magical law enforcement and military are trained in this style.”

“Why?”

“Ever since the Second Wizarding War: the rules of warfare changed.”

“How do you mean?”

“Have you heard of the term: nullification?”

“Raven talked to me about that. She told me it involved certain runes?”

“She’s a smart one, that Ravenclaw of yours. There are signs out there that can cancel out magic.”

“Oh no.”

“That’s how new threats are surfacing in our world. Many criminals out there are resorting to that.”

“And if witches and wizards become trapped in places with those runes.”

“They’d fall prey to the forces of darkness: rogue werewolves, wayward vampires, and even worse.”

“Magic is our greatest strength.”

“And our greatest weakness.”

“I always used to think wands were enough to defend us. Enough to fight back. Now I don’t know.”

“I don’t want to scare you, Harp. But this is a dangerous time we’re living in. The reign of Voldemort and his Death Eaters may have come to an end. But there are still bad people out there.”

“I never knew.”

“Now you do. There’s been talk of guns.”

“What?”

“In the Ministry. Due to the sheer number of nullifications and all their creative combinations.”

“Are you saying they’ll replace wands?”

“No, but we’ll be carrying both types of weapons soon enough. As well as knives and other things.”

“Can’t we develop our own runes to get rid of those nullification ones? Like fight fire with fire?”

“They’ve tried. But with the versatility those kinds of signs have, they have countless iterations.”

“Oh my God.”

“Don’t worry, Harp. There are countless Aurors keeping us safe. I’ll be joining them soon enough.”

“Is that why you wanted to become one? So you could help them out?”

“I wanted to become an Auror so I could protect people like you and your family. Good people.”

“But isn’t it dangerous, Charlie? I’m really worried about you!”

“Don’t worry about me, Harp. I’ve always been a warrior. I’ve been fighting ever since Hogwarts.”

“That’s how you and Roma met.”

“I thought I was the biggest, baddest bitch around.”

“And she put you in your place.”

“I did not expect that girl to throw up hands.”

“Ma’ taught her well.”

“She taught her girls how to fight. Your Ma’s badass.” Charlie stood up and walked on over to a laying Harper. She took both her hands into her own and pulled her upward so that she was standing: “That’s why she wants you to learn. It’s your turn now.”

“She never said who taught her that.” Harper whispered to Charlie: “She doesn’t talk about her past.”

“It’s not important.” Charlie said: “Listen, I used to be pissed off at everyone. At the whole world.”

Harper listened to her surrogate sister talk, looked at the arm-sleeve tattoo she had of thorny roses, scaly sea monsters, dragons, and feathered beasts. Charmaine had recently gotten a kraken tattoo on her back, its slimy tentacles stretched to one side of her ribs. The galleon that it held in its vice-like grasp looked to be savagely crushed into several, small pieces of driftwood and debris. She planned on getting a hip/thigh tattoo the next time around.

She was gorgeous too. Just like her mother and both her sisters. Charlie had a savage streak of crimson dye etched into her spiky crow black ponytail, sharp features and a curvaceously fit body.

“I didn’t have anyone in my life until I met your sister.” She continued: “Until I met your family.”

Charmaine took off Harper’s glasses, wiped both lenses clean, and plopped them back on her face.

“Your Ma' used to tell me: it’s not where you come from.” She said: “But where you go that matters.”

Charlie began putting on the red boxing mitts. She knocked both of her pads together, hard, again and again.

“I’m glad that we found you, Charlie.” Harper replied.

“I’m glad I was worth finding, Harp.” Charlie told her.

The ex-delinquent from Hogwarts signaled for her to attack the pads, her dreamcatcher and wind-chime earrings swayed from her ears in the breeze. Harper continued her assault, again and again.

“Bellamy’s Da’ is an Auror.” Harper revealed to Charlie when their training ended. “He told me.”

“He is?” Charlie’s auburn eyes widened at the newest discovery: “Why didn’t you tell me sooner?”

“His Da’ doesn’t want people to know. Bellamy only told me, Roan, and Nate. No one else knows.”

“Then why are you telling me now? I don’t know Bellamy Blake as well as you guys do.”

“You’re putting your life on the line. I want you to know. Crisscross promise me you won’t tell anyone else?”

“I promise.” Charlie crossed her index finger on her heart for good measure: “What division is he a part of?”

“I don’t know.” Harper shrugged: “Bellamy says he works underground. He says he trains people.”

“What’s his name?” Charlie asked.

“Marcus Kane.” Harper answered.

“Never heard of him.” The older girl frowned: “Which is strange considering how I’ve seen the names of everyone who trains us at the Academy and graduated in the past. Their names are listed.”

“Bellamy said this bunker is supposed to be hidden.” The younger girl insisted: “A secret base.”

“Hold up.” Charlie pursed her lips, thinking deeply about that. “Harper, can I ask you something?”

“What?”

“Did your friend ever mention: The Order of Phoenix?”

“The secret organization Albus Dumbledore made in order to fight Voldemort and his followers?”

“Exactly.”

“He didn’t. But we learned about them in History of Magic back at Hogwarts. They won the war.”

“They did.”

“Are they still together?”

“No. They were permanently disbanded long ago. But I heard they’d used bunker compounds in the past.”

“So they don’t exist anymore?”

“Afraid not.”

“That’s too bad. I liked reading about them. Those people are heroes.”

“They were.”

Harper and Charlie started heading back. They packed up their gear, carrying the jingling canteens.

“Will this Marcus Kane be coming later?” Charlie asked: “When he brings your friend over here?”

“I think so.” Harper replied. The pair of them began walking out of the woods: “Bellamy did mention that when last we spoke.” They started to approach McIntyre farm in the distance. “Why?”

“I want to meet him.” Charlie picked up Harper and sat her on her shoulders: “He sounds interesting.”

It was the same kind of thing Nyko would do for Harper when she wanted to see the Muggle festivals and parades that happened every once and a while in Arcadia.

“What’s our next lesson going to be about?” Harper asked Charlie as her feet dangled. She laughed.

“Low kick. Straight into the back of someone’s knee. So that they lose their balance and stumble.”

“Charlie, forget I asked.”

“It’s the surest way in telling someone to piss right off, Harp.”

“Godric give me strength.”

Roma had been next. Only her lesson wasn’t a lesson at all, but the unveiling of a very dangerous object. Her oldest sister had presented her with a dragonhide leather belt, Hungarian Horntail to be exact since Roma worked with dragons overseas, with a dragonhead buckle of blackened steel.

At first Harper was astounded by the gift Roma had gotten her. Until her oldest sister stretched it tight and the black leather belt snapped taut with tension. Then her amazement turned to horror, especially when Roma struck the grass in front of them with it like a whip. They were in the yard.

“This isn’t some fashion accessory.” Roma told her: “It’s a weapon you can use for an emergency.”

“Roma-” Harper began.

“Never leave it behind. You’re to wear this on your school uniform. At ALL times. Got it memorized?”

“But-”

“If you feel threatened.” Roma continued. “Hit them across the face with this. That’ll fix them up.”

“No!” Her little sister cried out, shaking her head in dismay: “I can’t do that!”

“It’s hard enough to get the message across.” Roma educated her: “But flexible enough to move.”

“I won’t!”

“Harper, you need to stand up for yourself!”

“I’m going to tell Ma’!”

“Who do you think ordered it?”

Harper was flabbergasted by that bit of news. She opened her mouth to speak but closed it just as fast. Roma wrapped the belt around her fist and drove it into a nearby alder tree in their backyard.

Roma sent haymaker after haymaker at the wood. It was the same kind of punch Charlie had been teaching her, the way Cooper taught them. The bark of the tree had torn off with every solid blow.

Her sister was overcome with shock, floored by what she was seeing.

“Wrap it around your hands like this.” Roma told Harper when she finished. “Like brass knuckles.”

“What are those?”

“Muggle dueling weapons. But they get the job done all the same.”

“Oh.”

“Feel this.” Roma had referred to the belt around her fist. Harper ran her fingers all over it: “See?”

“It’s so tough.” Harper breathed. When her older sister unfurled it, her knuckles were untouched.

“Dragonhide is one of the hardest substances in this world.” Roma told her: “My hand is just fine.”

“Bloody hell.” Her little sister whispered in awe.

“They’re unsuspecting. So be sure to put them on with all your pants and skirts under your robes.”

“I will.”

“Why didn’t you tell me?”

“Tell you what?”

“What they were doing to you. You should have written to me. I’m the big sister, Harp. Why?”

Harper averted her older sister’s grey eyes, same as their father’s, as she shifted from one foot to another. Roma was always the overprotective one, like Charlie. They watched over Bree and her.

“I already told Ma’ why.” Harper muttered. She looked up at her, but quickly looked back down.

“Well now you have to tell me.” Roma had her hands on her hips. She looked angry. Harper caved.

“Everyone had a wonderful time at Hogwarts. Ma’, you, Charlie, and Bree. I wanted to have that.”

“How could you have that if people were hurting you? How can you even be happy if you’re sad?”

“I don’t know.”

“That’s right, you don’t!”

Harper didn’t know how to respond to that. So she stayed silent. Roma stared at her in disbelief. Neither of them talked. They just stood there, across each other. Roma then swore under her breath.

“We’re your family, Harp. We have the right to know.”

“You would’ve all gone after them.” Harper whispered.

“God damn right, we would’ve.” Roma had scowled. She held her little sister’s chin to look at her.

“I’m really sorry.” The little sister apologized.

“You better be.” The older sister hugged her.

They stayed that way for a while. A pair of dark chestnut-haired McIntyre girls against the world.

“I talked to my old friends.” Roma admitted to Harper: “They’re yelling at all their little sisters.”

“Roma, no!” Harper wiggled out of Roma’s arms, shaking her head at her, red-faced. “You didn’t!”

“Gryffindors, Ravenclaws, and Hufflepuffs.” Roma confessed: “Their sisters should’ve said ‘hi’.”

“Oh my God!” Harper clutched all her curls and shook her glasses askew: “I can’t believe you!”

“Years of friendship with them should’ve bought you a safety blanket!” Roma snapped: “Maybe extend a hand of friendship at the very least!” She moved up to fix her little sister’s thick glasses.

“It’s not their fault!”

“Of course it is! It’s everyone’s fault! Anyone whose name isn’t McIntyre is to blame for this!”

“No they’re not!”

“They should’ve tried harder to be your friend and stand up for you instead of watching it happen!”

“I have friends!” Harper exploded: “REAL friends!” She’d stumbled sideways from her outburst, so Roma caught her: “It took me a while, but I found them!” Harper continued hotly: “And they’re not FAKE!”

“Okay.” Roma said quietly. “I’m sorry.” She rubbed her back while her sister tried calming down.

“They didn’t just watch it happen! They tried to help! They stood up for me when no one would!”

“I get it. Harper, I get it now.”

“You don’t.” The little sister whispered.

“I do.” Her older sister soothed her with ‘shhh’ sounds repeatedly. “I shouldn’t have gone behind your back.” More ‘shhhh’ sounds ensued. “I’m sorry.”

“They did stand up for me.” Harper repeated to Roma: “They nearly got expelled for it.” Her voice began to crack, but a couple more shushing sounds helped quell the sorrow underneath all that: “I didn’t see them for ages.”

“The Broken Lion Boys.”

“I almost lost them. All because they got in trouble for me. Because of me.”

“We can’t wait to finally meet them, Harp. You’ve talked about them so much.”

“They’re special.”

“A blind badger could see that.”

“That’s mean.”

“No one cares about badgers. They suck.”

“But the badger is the sigil animal for Hufflepuff.”

“I stand corrected. No one cares about Hufflepuffs. They suck.”

“Don’t tell Bree that.”

“Let her come at me.”

“Savage.”

“I’m a Ravenclaw ruffian. Remember?”

“Now I do.”

“You better.”

“Do you think they’ll like it here?”

“Who?”

“The boys?”

“Everyone who comes here falls in love with our farm.”

“Crisscross promise?”

“I promise.”

Bree had been the last and her lesson was by far the easiest. Mostly because Harper was already a proficient magic-user when given the opportunity. She performed exemplary in all her classes, taking all her schoolwork and studying close to heart because she loved the world of magic. Harper loved the enchantments and incantations she could perform with a flick of her ash and acacia wand.

Avid reader that she was, it would stand to reason that Harper knew her textbooks inside and out. She could accomplish many a traditional spell, step by step, with correct form and precise movements. Harper prided herself in being orthodox with her words and stances, a stark counterpart to Raven’s eccentric, unorthodox style. She loved brewing potions, tending to all the magical plants and roots in Herbology. Charms, Astrology, and Transfiguration came easily to her.

“Expelliarmus!” Harper voiced out, pointing her ash and acacia bound wand at Bree right in front.

Bree’s beech tree wand flew from her hands and into the air, dropping till her wee sister caught it.

“Brilliant!” Bree exclaimed. Her excitement rippled through her, surging with every jump she did.

Harper beamed as she sauntered towards her, handing the beech wand back and then trotting back.

“I already told Ma’ this wasn’t the problem.” Bree said out loud. “They disarmed you.” They retreated back into their dueling stances. “If you just had your wand, you would’ve done damage.”

“Whenever I get a chance to do magic.” Harper called: “Something good always happens to me.”

“That’s usually the case.” Bree replied. “Come.”

They sparred with wands again. Bree sent forth a red stream of light just as Harper slid downward through the rushes, underneath that single bright burst and let fly another blue blast of her own. “Expelliarmus!” Harper called out again while on the ground. Bree’s wand then flew upward again.

“Great improvisation.” Bree remarked. Her beech wand went hurtling down so she moved to catch it herself. “Most people forget bodily movements are advised when dueling.” She bent down to pull her little sister back up. “The smaller the target is.” Harper bounced as she rose. “The better.”

Harper and her middle sister practiced dueling near the stream that ran through the nearby forest, it teemed with many different colored fish, the same stream their Da’ took them to practice fishing.

They took a small break, circling each other clockwise and counterclockwise, tracing their feet.

“I love magic.” Harper said breathlessly. “I love it so much.”

“I do too.” Bree laughed right back at her: “We all do.”

“What was your favorite subject back when you were in Hogwarts?”

“Defense Against the Dark Arts.”

“That’s everyone’s favorite class.”

“Can you blame them?”

“No, I enjoy it as well.”

“It’s still better than Roma’s favorite subject.”

“Care of Magical Creatures!”

“Don’t get me wrong. I enjoyed Professor Hagrid’s beasts as well as anyone.”

“Some were just a little bit too scary?”

“Exactly.”

“Don’t let Roma hear you saying that.”

“Let her come at me.”

“But she’s a Ravenclaw!”

“And I’m a Hufflepuff!”

“Roma says that Hufflepuffs suck.”

“Shows what she knows. It doesn’t matter what your House is. It matters how you can swing it!”

“That’s what Ma’ says.”

“Ma’ is right.”

Both McIntyre girls practiced dueling once again. Bree shot streaks of yellow light at Harper, who dove sideways in order to avoid them again and again. With every burst, Harper threw herself over left and then right and then left again, dodging all of it with considerable effort. “Expelliarmus!”

Harper called the name of that spell while diving, her ash and acacia bound wand stretched out in front of her. She disarmed Bree’s beech wand, rolling forward and catching it while on her knees.

Bree had no words for that. So she responded the only way she knew how, with thunderous applause. Harper bowed jokingly for the imaginary crowd around them as her middle sister continued clapping. They returned to their farmhouse’s porch, sat on the steps, and ate watermelon.

“I still can’t believe the Duelist’s Dominion is happening during your second year!” Bree boasted.

“I cam’t eifer!” Harper struggled through a mouthful of fruit, so she swallowed it: “I can’t either.”

“The last time that tournament happened, Roma had been in her sixth year and I was in my fourth!”

“What is the Duelist’s Dominion, exactly? I’m still fuzzy about all the details.”

“A Hogwarts competition that first took place seven years after the Second Wizarding War.” Bree explained: “Every seven years afterwards it comes, since seven is the most magical number of all.”

Harper sank her fork in the Pyrex tub in between the two of them, filled with watermelon their Ma’ had cut up for them beforehand, and placed another enormous, misshapen piece in her mouth.

But she continued staring at her middle sister, who had those same grey eyes that Roma and their Da’ had. Harper was the only one in the family who inherited her Ma’s green eyes. Bree talked on.

“It was meant to honor each and every student that perished during the Battle for Hogwarts.” Bree clarified: “Every year lost someone.” She ate another watermelon part. “To commemorate them-”

“-we duel against each other?” Harper interrupted. “How does that honor them? We’re fighting.”

“In pairs.” Bree swallowed her mouthful. “You’re fighting with your partner and for your partner.” Her middle sister insisted some more: “It’s separated by grade. Seventh years duel seventh years only. First years duel first years. Each grade gets a pair of champions.” Bree finished: “For glory.”

“But does the glory really belong to us?”

“It does.”

“Why?”

“The person you fight alongside represents something.”

“Like what?”

“The bond of humanity itself.”

“I don’t understand.”

“You’re fighting alongside your fellow people, brothers and sisters, during times of great turmoil.”

The youngest, bespectacled McIntyre girl thought long and hard on that. 

“I think I get it.”

“I’m glad. It’s quite the honor."

Harper and Bree sat there on those porch steps, after decimating their Pyrex tub of watermelon, and wordlessly leaned against each other. Out of all her sisters, biological or surrogate, Harper always felt like Bree was the bubbliest one. She could always ask her things and she’d happily answer.

The littlest McIntyre girl turned the question, the very same one she’d been refraining from asking her middle sister through the weeks leading up to the Quidditch World Cup Final, over in her head.

She didn’t know how long it was before she finally cracked. Harper bit her lower lip and closed her eyes: “Bree.” Her middle sister turned into her, causing her glasses to become lopsided. “Hey!”

“Sorry.” Bree chuckled at how crooked Harper’s thick glasses would get by even the slightest movement: “There we go.” She had fixed them. “What’s up?” Bree looked at Harper expectantly.

“Can I ask you something?”

“Anything.”

“You have to keep it between us. Okay? Promise me you won’t tell a single soul. Not even Ma’.”

“If I can make this promise, I will. But if it’s about someone hurting you, I have to bring it up-”

“It’s not about that! Not at all! It’s about something else!” Harper said very quickly.

“Alright.”

“And you can’t ask me about it! Not ever again! It’s just for this one time, okay?”

“What is it?”

“Criss-cross promise!”

“By Dumbledore’s name.”

“Do it!”

“Here!” Bree crisscrossed her index finger over her heart, the same kind of promise that Harper would always do along with Roma and Charlie whenever a certain matter was extremely serious. “There. Are you happy, Harp?” She poked at her little sister’s tummy: “Now what is it you want?”

Harper took a deep breath and touched her hand to Bree’s chestnut hair, elegantly tied into a French braid. Bree always knew how to make herself presentable. All of the girls in her family knew how to dress in order to look elegant and nice. But her middle sister knew best when it came to looks.

“How do I get my hair to look nice like yours?”

Bree’s jaw dropped. The surprise on her face sent shockwaves of panic through Harper’s body because now she was afraid, she made a mistake. Now Bree would snitch on her to everyone else.

Her middle sister blinked and shook herself out of her astonishment. She cleared her throat multiple times, exaggerating the attempt with a fist. Harper had never asked about this sort of thing before.

Harper never used to care about her appearance, so this monumental moment was unprecedented.

But Bree had already crisscross promised her little sister and the realization of that fact caused her to quietly curse and kick herself at the missed opportunity. She struggled to find some loophole, some way to break her contract. But alas, there was no way around it. Bree had checkmated herself.

Until an imaginary lightbulb lit up inside of her. Her mouth formed an “O” and she elongated the sound, yet another trait she had picked up on after their Da’. “Can’t we make this a conference?”

“No!” Harper pronounced this by shoving both her hands right at Bree’s shoulder. “We cannot!”

“Why ever not?” Bree tried to sound innocent, but couldn’t: “Why come to me?” She attempted to support the charade, but failed once again, miserably. “Surely Roma and Charlie-” Bree laughed.

“Stop it!” Harper shoved at her middle sister’s shoulder yet again, finally managing to topple her.

Bree couldn’t contain her laughter anymore. She keeled over with mirth as Harper vaulted on her.

“You’re always going on about how you know the ‘essence’ of beauty!” Harper punctuated the word ‘essence’ with mocking air quotes. Then she kept pushing Bree, who kept on laughing, down further and further onto the planks of their porch: “Stop it!”

“So it is about beauty!” Bree hooted. Harper blushed furiously; her cheeks were emblazoned with the deepest kind of scarlet. Her mouth had opened even further than Bree’s had the very first time.

“I get it!” Bree turned the jaws of defeat into a smile of victory: “Everything makes sense!” She resumed her bout of thrilling laughter: “Of course I’ll lend my expertise to you, Harp! Of course!”

Harper tried putting her middle sister into a head lock, but her body got in the way. Bree was far too big for Harper’s skinny arms. After that one exchange, Bree showed Harper all of the beauty magazines she catalogued, relics from her time at Hogwarts. Especially the ones about hairstyles.

In the summer days leading up to this Saturday, Harper had taken her research on how to braid exotic hair knots seriously. She scanned every beauty magazine Bree had given her till she found it.

Harper McIntyre fell in love with the elegant hair braid she read about in a past issue of Witches Weekly. The one that wrapped from one side of a girl’s head to around her neck and onto her shoulder like a knotted eel.

From the moment she laid eyes on the moving pictures showcasing steps on how to tie it to the caption that displayed its name, Abaia, she knew. It was everything she’d need to make a change.

Not too big that she’d lose sight of herself and not too small that it’d go unchecked. But a change, nonetheless, like how a caterpillar cocooned itself into a chrysalis before its final transformation.

From larva to butterfly. Or in Harper’s case, from what she was now to who she dreamed of being.

A prettier girl. Someone to finally look at. Even for a little bit.

It was the first thing Harper ever remembered wanting. Ever since she first learned about the consequences a mirror brought to a child when they realized what they were looking at. Sure there was the joy and humor at watching yourself doing funny things and re-enacting beloved movie scenes. But that wore off once Harper realized she didn’t like looking at the girl who stared back.

She gazed at her reflection. At the thicket of chestnut hair on her head, all tangled up in curls and knots. At her skinny figure, with her bony arms and knobby-kneed legs. At the green eyes staring out her thickly framed glasses, that squinted without them, like fresh Brussels sprouts. But what gutted her the most was how plain her face looked, common instead of genuine. Not at all unique.

She studied all her features, frowned, and then went to find both her sisters. And then her mother.

There was barely a comparison. It looked as if she had been adopted into a cult of brunette sirens.

Harper looked at their slender frames and stunning faces, their vibrant personalities and sleek hair. Their shapely legs, strong arms, and curvaceous hips, the bodies that clothing molded around them as if they were mannequins. The kinds of faces that stopped boys and men alike in their own tracks.

They were beautiful.

So why wasn’t she? She was a McIntyre too.

All McIntyre girls were supposed to be striking. They had started off pretty and grew up gorgeous.

That’s how it was. How it would always be. Why did she have to be the exception? Why not her?

She cried about it periodically. Mostly in secret. The hardest cases were when she cried herself to sleep. But none of the tears she felt would ever come close to the very first time they had happened.

Harper still remembered that time when she returned home from exploring the forest-filled perimeter of her family’s farm. She had been eight years old and her adventures left her very filthy.

The bespectacled, chestnut-haired girl felt her cheeks burning up just at the mere memory of it all.

She’d been covered in grass stains. Patches of mud caked her overalls and shoes. Weeds and twigs stuck out of her hair. Her glasses were askew, as they always were whenever she moved in haste.

Her parents were both resting against opposite brick pillars near the porch railings of their farmhouse and their balcony’s hammock outside. Their legs touched lovingly while they whispered things to one another.

When the girl tried sneaking past them up the wooden plank steps leading to their house, they saw.

Cooper McIntyre did a double-take. Her mouth dropped wide open in complete shock. It wasn’t the first time she’d seen her daughter in such a state. But it was the most unclean she’d ever looked. Her father laughed aloud at the sight and nudged her mother’s leg, teasing: “She gets it from you.”

“Shut your face, Nyko.” Cooper whispered. Her cheeks turned a deep crimson, as they always did whenever her husband poked fun at her. She covered her eyes and sighed: “She’s half yours too.”

Afterwards, when Cooper managed to wrestle an unruly Harper into the bathtub, who tried wiggling out of her grasp many a time, and rubbed bubbly soap onto her hair and skin, they talked.

“How on earth-” Her mother grunted the whole time she scrubbed at her: “-did you get so dirty?”

“I was fighting some dragons.” Harper shrugged like it was no big deal. “Killed a lot, spared a few.” The eight-year old girl struggled to escape her mother’s doting, wincing through all the soap.

Her thick glasses rested on the counter near the sink. Harper always resented her need for them. She hated how she looked with them on, how they magnified her green pupils for all people to see. Harper still believed they were the whole reason why she didn’t look like her mother and sisters.

“You mean you were getting lost in that imagination of yours.” Cooper muttered. She wrung the water out of a washcloth over her wee baby girl’s head: “Twirling around with your sound effects.”

“I do not twirl!” Harper said hotly through a face full of bubbles. “I charge with my own cavalry!”

“Remind me to check on what kinds of books you’ve been reading.” Her mother shook her head, chuckling the word ‘cavalry’. “I always see you running off and making rowdy, explosion noises.”

“That’s cause no one else protects the kingdom.” Her daughter continued stubbornly. “But I can.”

“I’ll say.” Cooper wiped off Harper’s face and cupped both of her daughter’s cheeks to look at her. “What am I going to do with you?”

“Reward me with dessert?” Harper bit her lower lip and looked hopeful: “Like oatmeal cookies?”

“Not the strawberry ice cream?”

“I thought you said we didn’t have anymore?”

“I’ll say whatever I have to in order to protect those poor groceries from you and your appetite.”

“You lied to me!”

“You have a sweet-tooth!”

“I do not-wait. What does that mean?”

“It means you eat a lot of sugar. You like eating loads of it. Which would explain a lot of things.”

“Oh.”

“Yeah.”

“Then either dessert will do!” The eight-year old girl’s smile lit up brightly: “It’ll lift my spirits!”

“I didn’t know spirits needed lifting.” The mother playfully pouted: “Didn’t you slay the dragons?”

“We did.” Harper said solemnly. She held a sad, patriotic hand over her heart. “But at great cost.”

“What happened?”

“All of my strongest knights perished from dragon fire today.”

“Oh no.” Cooper mouthed ‘perished’ with awe. Her daughter’s vocabulary always amazed her.

“I had to give a speech over all their ashes. Their families were crying the whole time. It was sad.”

“How many died?”

“Too many to count.”

“Hundreds?”

“Thousands.”

Cooper McIntyre laughed aloud at Harper’s macabre expression. She ran her suds-covered hand through her own dark brown hair in disbelief at her daughter’s behavior. Cooper planted a kiss on her youngest girl’s wet forehead and moved to grab a nearby towel from the rack to dry her body.

“You played by yourself?” Cooper asked her youngest daughter while toweling her hair. “Again?”

The eight-year-old avoided her eyes and nodded. She made small waves with the bathtub’s water.

“I thought you were playing with the other local girls.” The woman whispered. “They invited you.”

Harper’s mouth turned into a bitter line. It quivered before the girl turned away from her mother, hiding away her own face. She didn’t want her to see. Even though her mother was far from blind.

“Harper?” Cooper asked pointedly. She hadn’t missed how red her daughter’s cheeks became or how her eyes began to glisten. Whenever Harper turned away and refused to look, it was bad news.

When Harper didn’t respond to her again, Cooper gently turned her face around so she could see.

“They wouldn’t play with me.” Her eyes were red. “They didn’t want me there in the first place.”

“What?” Her mother looked as if someone had just slapped her. “But they’re the ones who had-”

“Their mums made them invite me! They didn’t want to.” Her daughter spat: “They told me that.”

The mother’s jaw dropped at her youngest daughter’s admission. Cooper’s own cheeks reddened.

“They talked about how they thought I was weird and how I smelled funny to them.” Harper said.

“Smelled-” Something dawned on Cooper’s face. She groaned: “You played with the mandrakes again, didn’t you?” Harper’s body language confirmed it. “I thought I told you they weren’t ripe-”

“It was only for a little bit.”

“They’re not toys, Harper!”

“I’m sorry.”

“You better be.”

“They ignored me after that and played dolls with each other.” Harper looked away: “So I left.”

Cooper narrowed her eyes, scowling. “Tell me their names.” Her jaw held clenched teeth. “I’ll-”

“No! Don’t call their mums!” Harper cried. “They’ll know it was me. That’ll make them hate me!”

“Harper-”

“Don’t you see?” The girl shook her head sadly, the water moved around her: “I’m not like you!”

“What do you mean by that?” Cooper asked Harper. When she didn’t answer her, she repeated it.

“I’m not like you.” Harper reiterated. “I’m not Roma.” Her nose started to sniffle. “I’m not Bree.”

“What’re you talking about-”

“They said I was ugly.”

The silence that filled the space between them was an abyss. There was no light to be seen there.

“And they’re right.” Harper whispered to Cooper. Her bottom lip had trembled. “I know they are.”

“You’re not ugly.” The mother said fiercely. “Harper, you’re not. You’re eight.” She took her daughter’s chin and made her look.” You have so many years ahead of you. You’ve yet to grow.”

“I am.” Harper shook her head sadly.

“Fuck those brats.” Cooper had muttered. “They can all fuck themselves as far as I’m concerned.”

“Ma’! You did the Muggle swear! Twice in a row!”

“So what?”

“You get mad whenever Roma or Bree use that curse.”

“I thought you weren’t either of them?”

“I’m not.”

“Like I said: fuck them.” Cooper told her. “They’re a bunch of stinkers. You’re too good for them.”

And that was when Harper started to cry slowly, softly. Then all at once. It was as if a floodgate held all her tears at bay the entire time she spoke with her mother and when the truth came out: the flooding began on her face. Cooper wrapped the towel around her youngest daughter, cradled her out of the bathtub, and sat them both on the toilet. Harper felt her mother hug her close to her chest.

Cooper whispered soothing ‘shhh’s and ‘okay’s again and again while Harper sobbed against her.

“I-I k-k-know you-don’t like it w-when I’m by m-m-myself.” The young girl stuttered as she wept.

Her mother tried rocking her. Tried shushing her again. Tried saying all the things her daughter was good at, was known for in the family. Harper knew she’d been a crybaby. She still was today.

“I h-h-hate it t-too. I g-g-get l-l-lonely.” The girl stammered. “B-but it’s j-just easier f-f-for me.”

Through the tears and gentle wailing, Cooper held Harper close to her like a mother bear did her cub.

“I wouldn’t want you to be friends with people like that.” Cooper said. “They’d make you mean and stupid just like them.” Harper sniffled loudly. “Your friends will be such wonderful people.”

Harper shook her head.

Cooper turned Harper’s tiny body to face her and gently tapped her finger to her nose. “Like you.”

The daughter continued shaking her head up at her mother.

“Whenever I picture you making friends for the first time-” Cooper tightened her arms around the youngest McIntyre girl: “-I see you laughing with them and playing with them. You are so happy.”

“How will I make friends when I get to Hogwarts-” Harper replied. “-if I can’t even make friends with Muggles?” Cooper held her daughter close. “I’m always going to be alone! I just know it!”

“That's not true.”

"How do you know?"

"I just do."

“But how will I get ready in time?”

“You’ve got three years to prepare for that.”

“I want to go there now!” Harper wept.

“I know you do.” Cooper whispered, rocking the wee McIntyre while she cried: “We all did too.”

Her mother never paid that toll three years ago and Harper never reminded her. It was only when Harper began attending Hogwarts herself that her mother started cracking down on all the cursing.

Cooper McIntyre always talked to her daughters about how she wanted them to be better than her.

And she taught them as much.

But that always confused Harper. Because her mother was the best person she knew in this world.

There was no one more compassionate and loving than her. How could she ever think otherwise?

Did it have something to do with why her mother never talked about the family that disowned her?

How she grew sad whenever her oldest daughters had asked about their grandma and their aunts?

People they barely knew and who barely knew them in turn.

All because her mother fell in love with a Muggle man and refused to either leave or Obliviate him.

The only person who helped her through the scorn and solitude was her godmother.

A vivaciously beautiful and tolerant woman who she loved and respected more than her own mother, the cruel and strict, mysterious woman who lost all faith in her daughter and forbade her from ever returning.

There was that one time, several days after Christmas had ended, when Harper saw something that shook her right to her core.

Harper had witnessed Cooper crying on her bed, clutching the skull bandana that had once wrapped the silver compass, the one that pointed her towards her home with an obsidian needle. She heard her mother sob repeatedly with gritted teeth at the skull bandana: "I hate you." What had her Ma’s past been like? What sins needed absolution?

The Gryffindor girl promised herself that she would discover the truth about her mother’s past life.

And then, after getting to the bottom of everything, she’d embrace her mother and whisper to her:

“It’s okay, Ma’. I know now. I understand. I don’t care. I love you, Da’, Roma, Bree, and Charlie.”

No matter what her mother would say to her in return, she’d just say back again and again, always:

“I love our family.”

One of these days, Harper McIntyre would fulfill her promise. She wanted to make a habit of keeping ones she made. The last one the bespectacled girl kept had been fixing her mother’s compass for her.

Throughout the several days leading up to this one particular Saturday, Harper had taught herself how to properly wash her chestnut hair in order to achieve the sleekest shine. She researched which sort of conditioner to use with what specific shampoo for this one exact time, but only after days of simply rinsing it. Then Harper mimicked all the ways to properly brush her hair before drying.

Then she brushed it softly and firmly and then softly again, again and again and again, before she then made a spray every now and then with a particular non-magical hair product her sisters loved. Harper then took out the jasmine scented magical oil she ordered via owl from Madam Primpernelle's Beautifying Potions at 275 Diagon Alley. The one that enhanced exquisite braiding.

Harper then went about the particular steps and precise movements it took to braid her chestnut hair into the ‘Abaia’ eel. She had already memorized and rehearsed all the necessary movements.

The girl wove strands of her coiled-up chestnut hair across each other. She likened it to crocheting, only the needles were her fingers and the fabric her curls. Harper bit her lower lip as she worked.

While she performed those motions in front of her horizontal cabinet mirror, the one with all those flowers her Da’ had carved from the wood, she analyzed her reflection. Harper studied both her emerald eyes behind her thickly framed glasses, the shape of her nose, the curves of both her cheeks, and the crescent dip of her smile. Same as her mother’s. She stared at all of it and wished.

Let there be one thing that stands out tonight. Her teeth. Her hair. Her smell. Let there be just one.

So that he notices. 

Out of all her memories from her first year, she thought of one. They had been in Potions class. Professor Becca Franco, Head of Slytherin, charged them all with making a Boil Cure. Harper was paired up with Fox, next to Roan with Bellamy. All their cauldrons were bubbling. One partner read aloud the formula while the other added and stirred ingredients into their individual mixtures.

This had been in October. Long before Clarke Griffin stole her mother’s compass and thrown it into the branches of the Whomping Willow. Long before the boys had burned the tree down in order to retrieve it. Before hope had been stolen from and then returned to her all in the course of a single evening.

Harper had recited directions from their first-year Potions textbook. Word for word. Line for line.

Roan had been following along, alternating from looking at his own book and looking at her. He was copying her, which the boys always did whenever things were difficult. Bellamy handled the ingredients, only he wasn’t adding or stirring a single thing. He wasn’t following at all. Instead, the Muggleborn boy had made a racing track out of snake fangs, watching four horned slugs race.

“What on earth are you doing?” Harper squealed, dumbfounded with what she was seeing him do.

“Shhhhhh!” Bellamy shushed, holding a finger against his lips: “This is starting to get interesting.”

None of the horned slugs moved. Not a single one. They were laying there like slimy, wet pebbles.

“Mate.” Roan tapped his shoulder, still immersed in their joint textbook: “I need porcupine quills.”

“How many?” Bellamy muttered. His hazel eyes were still latched onto the lifeless horned slugs.

“Two.” Roan whispered. “Hurry! Professor Franco is looking!” He jabbed at Bellamy’s shoulder.

Without a second glance, Bellamy gathered both their feathered quills and then handed them over.

Roan, not bothering to check, dropped both writing instruments into their cauldron. The potion they had inside belched and burped. And then it farted.

Harper and Fox had already finished their Cure for Boils potion. Pink smoke rose from their cauldron. They successfully completed their assignment and were now awaiting Professor Franco.

Bellamy and Roan’s mixture was a nasty type of brown, the kind leftover from a constipated hippo.

It was wrong. So very, very wrong.

Harper said as much. She had hissed at Bellamy: “That’s not what you’re supposed to be doing!”

“Your point being?” Bellamy mumbled. He’d snapped his fingers at the slugs, willing them to go.

“This project is worth 30% of our grade for the fall term!” Harper hissed again, nearly snake-like.

“Who cares?” Bellamy failed at stifling a yawn. The messy-haired, freckled boy’s mouth stretched.

Harper’s jaw dropped at that. Roan was scrambling, now that the girls had finished. The long-haired boy began tossing in wrong ingredients. Roan threw in a mortar and slam-dunked a pestle.

Fox had already moved towards the dungeon faucet to rinse off their cutting board, scale, and knives. Harper pointed her finger at a paragraph in her textbook: “Did you read the color brown?!”

“There goes the baker with his tray, like always.” Bellamy softly sang an unfamiliar tune under his breath. “The same old bread and rolls to sell.”

“What are you going on about?!” Harper replied hotly, her frustration over his behavior showed.

“Be our guest. Be our guest.” Bellamy's eyes widened in horror over her total lack of acknowledgement. He’d turned to Harper: “Life is so unnerving. For a servant who's not serving.”

“Have you lost your mind?!” Harper shook disbelievingly. “Are we really talking nonsense now?!”

“Are we really leaving the Disney box unchecked now?!” Bellamy'd looked insulted: “Seriously?!”

Roan moved in between them, gathering all the snake fangs and horned slugs, and dumping them into their cauldron. The smell of moldy, rotten cheese then filled the air. He stabbed at it all with a nearby ladle.

“Now remember, Belle.” Bellamy pinched his nose with one hand and wagged a disapproving finger towards her with the other. His voice began sounding nasally: “Don’t go to the west wing.”

She didn’t know what any of that meant at the time. “I am not a bell!” Harper protested. At first, she thought he was referring to Hogwarts: “And tough eggs! I’ve already been to the west wing!”

Harper put both of her hands on her hips: “Zoe showed me that atrium! It’s big!” She’d scoffed at him.

Bellamy Blake stared at her after she said that, as if she was an alien species. He mulled over her words.

And then the tan, black-haired Gryffindor boy burst out laughing. “What’s so funny?” Harper had eyed him warily, shocked by his reaction. He chortled all his mirth loudly. “Why’re you laughing?”

He never answered her. The boy was too overcome with all his chuckling, hooting, and snickering.

“Stop that!” Harper hissed. Heads began turning, bodies started shifting. She backed away. “Stop!”

Bellamy clutched his stomach and doubled over, his hazel eyes watered from how breathless and unruly he became. He roared with it now: “How are you laughing this much?” Harper McIntyre’s face reddened when the other students had begun staring. They looked just as confused as she was. “Don’t you need to breathe?” Professor Franco frowned at their shenanigans and approached them.

“If you’ve quite finished, I-” Harper began, her cheeks were aflame now. Then she saw what Roan was doing. “What is wrong with you?!” The long-haired Gryffindor boy had begun taking other people’s unused ingredients and hiding the evidence in their cauldron. He’d flung in what he stole.

Fox returned to them as soon as she realized what Roan and Bellamy conceived in their cauldron. “Do you realize what you’ve done?!” The girl cried in dismay. Their potion, blacker than octopus ink, was boiling over the sides. Its corrosive, frothy, and smelly bubbles ate away at their lab table.

All the students in their class were voicing out their fear and disgust with the concoction now melting the iron frame of Roan and Bellamy’s cauldron. Professor Franco saw what was happening and tried to reach them, but the sea of panicking students hindered her. The festering potion fizzled.

Professor Franco raised her wand to fix the matter, but she tripped over a student, so her wand flew out of her hands.

“Bellamy!” Roan yelled. “Look!” He grabbed at his best friend and shook: “Look! Damn you! Look!”

At long last Bellamy’s laughter stopped, it became replaced with wordless dread instead. His hazel eyes widened with terror and then he cursed out loud for all the class to hear: “OH FUCK!”

Roan mirrored his best friend’s expression and tried, in vain, to explain himself to anyone listening. “That’s not my fault!” He pointed before surrendering both his hands way up high. “I’ve been framed!” Roan turned to Fox, grabbed her collar with his hands and shook at her: “You believe me, right?! This isn’t my potion!”

“Fuck!” Bellamy took off his robes, showing his orangey red striped tie and white dress shirt over khaki slacks, and used it as one large makeshift mitten. “Fuck!” He seized their meltdown of a cauldron, carrying it far from everyone near him. “Fuck!” Then Bellamy heaved it out the dungeon.

Into the hallway outside.

The failure of a potion exploded outside of Professor Franco’s classroom. An avalanche of pitch-black smoke billowed into the dungeon like an overturned chimney or furnace. When the chaos had finally cleared, the rest of the class could see the remains of the wreckage: and there stood Bellamy.

Covered from head to toe in soot, doubled over with a terrible, hacking cough. “Fuck.” Bellamy Blake croaked while fanning the smoke in front. He looked to everyone: “That was fucked, huh?”

Roan Azgeda and Bellamy Blake received two weeks-worth of detention for the Boil Cure Debacle alone. Only by the occurrence of the Gryffindor Girl Domino later in the months to come would its infamy be rivaled. It had not occurred to Harper McIntyre, at the time, that out of all the Muggle things she knew, or her family knew, Disney films would be the rarest of exceptions.

Her Da’ slapped his hands onto his forehead when she finally mentioned this to him, back when she had returned home for Christmas break during her first-year, bellowing with disappointment: “I knew I’d forgotten something!” Cooper, Nyko, Roma, Charlie, Bree and Harper spent the better part of that winter break catching themselves up on years’ worth of wonderous animation via DVD.

And then Harper finally understood the reference.

By the time Saturday evening had begun making itself known along the fringes of the horizon, McIntyre farm was serenely lit, with a few orbs of magical light levitating above and around, drifting here and there around their farmhouse and property. The fireflies were out, they blended in with their surroundings with their own dimly lit glows. 

The picnic tables were filled to the brink with scores upon scores of appealing appetizers, delicious deserts, and exceptional entrees: devilled eggs, Cornish pasties, bacon and steak pies, smoked brisket, roast beef, lamb chops, onion and sausage casserole, ambrosia fruit salad, chicken paprikash, baked potatoes swimming with butter, gyro sandwiches, spicy crab dip with chips, and more.

All her family and friends were outside, relaxing on the grass in front of the projector that screened the pre-game analytics and commentary, on the side of their big red barn, for the upcoming Quidditch World Cup Final.

Cooper, Roma, Charlie, Bree, Raven, Zoe, and Fox were dressed in England colors, they wore red crossed white jerseys and lines of war paint on all their cheeks. Nyko was clad in Canadian colors.

Her Da’ wore a white hockey jersey with a red maple leaf and redder borders. He held her Ma’ in his arms as the two of them swayed back and forth in the summer breeze, Harper saw them kiss.

Fox and Monroe were showing off their clockwork hummingbirds for Roma, Bree, Charlie, and Raven. The girls cheered and whooped every time their mechanical birds performed many a trick.

Zoe exclaimed: “And then they can do this!” Both birds performed a game and of chicken and veered off at the last second. Fox swaggered: “But they also do this!” The two birds barrel rolled.

“Those are amazing!” Bree whistled her appreciation when the metal hummingbirds somersaulted.

“Who made those?” Roma asked, her mouth stayed open in awe. “And where can I get my own?”

Zoe and Fox made an extravagant show of hands towards Raven, who hid behind Charlie whilst blushing with embarrassment. “Why am I not surprised?” Charlie tittered. Roma and Bree clapped.

“You should start up an Etsy.” Her Da’ suggested. “You’d get rich off the royalties alone for sure.”

“What is this Etsy?” Raven asked: “Is that some kind of Muggle bank? I already go to Gringotts.”

“Not exactly.” Cooper chuckled. “You’re an inventor and you’ve got quite a future ahead of you.”

“This is nothing.” Raven downplayed. Her cheeks turned redder than before. “It’s just a hobby.”

When Harper made her way outside, down the porch steps from their farmhouse, everyone turned to look at her. When they did, all of their jaws dropped: Harper had looked absolutely stunning, more than she’d ever been. More than usual. Which was a rare occurrence in its own right.

Roma and Charlie were struck speechless. Fox and Monroe stopped moving. Their metallic birds knocked into their faces, but they didn’t seem to mind. Nyko became a statue made of hewn stone.

Bree beamed and began whistling with both her fingers. Raven started cheering and calling out: “Resu-wrecked-it!” But it was Cooper that Harper sought. Her mother smiled; her eyes crinkling.

The woman locked green eyes with her youngest daughter, studying how the girl, even with those thick glasses of hers, had now sported a sleek, shiny cinnamon bun of a hair knot behind her head.

Harper McIntyre tugged at the “Abaia” around her neck and over her shoulder, that knotted eel made from her once wild, unruly chestnut hair. She wore Eliza Morley’s Falmouth Falcon jersey, the team she played for during the regular season, atop red and white checked shorts. The spyglass that Raven gave her this past Christmas hung around her neck by a leather strap, old and worn but capable nonetheless.

Harper raised and extended it wide so that her perspective curved. Over at the north fence of their property. That was where the boys would be arriving via soccer ball Portkey. Harper waited with bated breath. This was how her Saturday started coming to an end. But not before she had her way.


	4. The End Of All Things

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> A Spec Ops mission goes horribly wrong.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> "Born For This" by The Score.

It was midnight when they descended into hell.

The shadows Apparated along the outskirts of the trailer park like muffled will-o-wisps of darkness. One after the other. Decked out in combat gear. Bullet proof tactical vests fitted with double-taped cartridges of ammunition. Blackened balaclavas underneath helmets with night vision goggles. Coal-colored boots, gloves. Every one of them held assault rifles with silencers.

There were twelve of them in total. Evenly spaced out by a couple of yards each. They had surrounded the whole park. It was a harvest moon tonight. It showered them all with dim light.

“This is as far as our magic goes.” Russell Lightbourne informed them over comms. “Runes inbound.” The MACUSA captain hand-signaled. “Move.” They approached from four directions.

North. South. East. West. It didn’t matter who was where so long as they moved as one unit.

Sergeant Gabriel Santiago tightened his fist around the foregrip underneath his M4A1 and raised the silenced barrel as he moved through the tall grass. He aimed through his ACOG sight.

And followed his captain as they started to pass by the trailers of the park one by one. Slowly.

Quietly.

Upon exiting the glade and avoiding the gravel-ridden cul-de-sac, they knew something was wrong. The trailer park looked dark and abandoned. No lights. No voices. Nothing whatsoever.

Even though upon initial reconnaissance, the place was booming with activity three days past.

With the sounds of laughter and children playing. Of arguing and fighting between neighbors.

Of human activity. Loud and soft. Random.

Now it was as still and silent as a graveyard.

“Omega Three, this is Epsilon Six.” Russell whispered. “We are securing the area now.”

“Rog, Epsilon Six.” Omega Three voiced over. “Watch yourselves out there. Stay frosty.”

Russell Lightbourne leveled the stock of his TAR-21 close to his chest. He looked through his holographic sight and gestured for Gabriel to join him. The sergeant regrouped on his captain.

“We need to check these trailers.” Russell voiced to them all. “Pair up.” He tightened his hands along the angled grip of his rifle and hand-signaled again: “Infiltrate and clear.” They separated.

Into duos. All of them turned on their tactical night vision goggles fitted atop of their helmets.

Russell and Gabriel went after the first trailer together. Gabriel felt for the handle and when he realized it was unlocked, he nodded at Russell. The captain signaled; the sergeant opened it.

Slowly. Silently. Just a peek. Enough for Russell to fit the silenced barrel of his TAR-21 into the crack and eased it open bit by bit. So that the over-arching swing of the door then gave way.

Gabriel followed Russell in as the two of them aimed down sights through the length of the trailer. Russell knelt and looked from left to right as Gabriel covered him from up overhead.

“Sir.” Gabriel informed his captain. “On the bed.” The sergeant gestured at a cot at the far end.

“Contact.” Russell surged forward. “Take them.” The captain and his sergeant moved as one.

One force. One unit. All with the goal of disabling the person without incident. Russell gagged the mouth with a nearby sock while Gabriel zip-tied wrists and ankles. It only occurred to them afterward that the person hadn’t struggled. Hadn’t made a single sound. The body was too still.

It was a ragdoll of a woman.

“Dead.” Russell reported after he checked her neck’s pulse. “Dead for ages. But there’s no smell.” Gabriel double-checked the whole trailer. But there was nothing. It was one small area.

There was a propane tank underneath the stove in the kitchen. Gabriel checked to see that it was off. It wasn’t. So, he tightened the valve at the top of it and turned off the smell of petrol.

“Captain.” Lieutenant Ryker Desai’s voice crackled over the comms. “We’ve got a problem.”

“What is it, Desai?” Russell checked the woman’s body for marks. For wounds. There was none.

“There’s a body here.” Ryker informed the team. “A man.” There was a pause. “He’s dead, sir.”

“Are there any marks on your body?” Russell asked him quietly. “Because our corpse is clean.”

“None, sir.”

“There’s a family in this one, sir.” Lieutenant Jade Morrison radioed in too. “All five are dead.”

“What’s wrong, Morrison?” Russell noticed something was wrong in her voice. “What is it?”

“There’s children here, sir.” Jade struggled to maintain herself. “A baby.” They went quiet.

“It’s dead.” Jade sounded nearly dead herself. “The baby is dead.”

Nobody talked for the longest time. All of them wondered the same thing. Same question.

Who? What? What abomination in this unholy world would ever harm a baby? A child? Why?

They shook themselves out of it. Even though that was a flash of humane emotion, they were soldiers. Hardened warriors. They checked the environment. Two trailers had a sun roof latch.

That could be opened, someone could’ve crept in unnoticed and killed them. How’d they do it?

Other voices echoed through the comms. Confirming the bodies, they found all over the trailer park. They all reported corpses as well. Some were young children, old people, couples and recluses. All of them dead on ice. Neither one of them had a mark on them or anything at all.

“Was it the propane?” Gabriel asked. “Maybe the other trailers have them on as well?”

Russell informed them: “Check to see for live propane underneath the trailer stoves.”

They confirmed that there were. But none of them had been turned on. Only theirs was on.

“This wasn’t propane.” Russell muttered. “This was magic.”

“But the runes.” Gabriel whispered. “Shouldn’t they have-”

“They were killed before the runes were made. Our intelligence was off. Way off.”

“So, what now?”

There was a long pause. It started to look like the MACUSA captain didn’t know what to do.

“Split off.” Russell had commanded. “Finish clearing the trailers and report back what you see.”

Gabriel and Russell took the next trailer. And the next. Still they found people nestled in bed.

Some were tucked beneath covers. Some were laid out in the open. As if they’d been sleeping.

And then they’d been killed while they dreamt.

Their comrades found and communicated the same circumstances. People in bed. Old. Young.

Thin. Fat. Black. White. Brown. All of the skin colors underneath the sun. All of the variety. All.

Dead. Just dead. Because death was the true equalizer. It happened to everyone. Magic or not.

Everyone died at some point. For these people, it just came sooner for them. Rather than later.

And worst of all. They hadn’t found their target. The criminal they’d tracked down to this park.

They did find some nullification runes though. Spaced throughout every trailer exterior and interior. The twelve members of the extraction team had located and disabled many of them.

But there were still some to be accounted for. They were well hidden and strong enough to hinder their progress. The team could not perform complex spells in this type of environment.

They were at a massive disadvantage. They couldn’t Apparate. Not from this distance at least.

When all the trailers were cleared, Russell commanded they form a perimeter and regroup on a single trailer. The first one Russell and Gabriel cleared. Russell opened comms to headquarters.

Half of the team formed a protective boundary around the trailer. The other half were inside.

“Command.” Russell said: “This is Epsilon Six.” The MACUSA captain paced the interior of the trailer with two fingers on his earbud. “No signs of the target. I repeat, no signs of the target.”

“Epsilon Six, this is Command.” A voice echoed back. “What about the occupants of the trailer park? Have you rounded them up for interrogation?” Russell shook his head as that was said.

“Negative.” Captain Russell Lightbourne informed comms. “Command, they’ve all been killed.”

“Come again, Epsilon Six.” The voice didn’t seem to understand the situation. “Did you find them?” The voice started to sound off louder, higher than before. "They are a vital objective.”

“They’re dead.” Russell repeated with a gravely, grizzled voice. “We found all of their corpses.”

Command went deathly silent now. The other members of the team looked at each other with unease. “Leave, Epsilon Six.” The voice sounded urgent over comms. “Abort mission. Abort.”

“Rog.” Russell switched comm channels: “Omega Three, requesting immediate extraction.”

“Copy, Epislon Six.” Omega Three sounded. There was a long pause and then the fizzling out of a magical spell. “Epsilon Six, there are still runes in your area.“ Another failed attempt. “You need to leave the trailer park.” The third spell attempt went out like a frequency. “Move now.”

“Copy, Omega Three.” Captain Russell Lightbourne faced the members of his team and commanded them: “Gather yourselves now.” He had a grim look on his face. “We are leaving.”

The MACUSA force went into formation and left the trailer. They spread out into two layers of lines and began approaching the edge of the park. In order to evac, they needed to go farther.

Way past the outer boundary.

Where they first Apparated in.

Into the dark and dreary woods.

They moved quickly towards an open field, trying to make the distance before any surprises.

And that was when the foghorn sounded.

A deep, booming cry that rumbled throughout the nighttime air. It rippled through the roots and the trunks of nearby trees. All of the branches and leaves shivered from the loudest noise.

All twelve members of the force crouched down and activated their night-vision goggles. They formed a diamond-like formation and organized their assault rifles into a phalanx of firepower.

“Captain!” Lieutenant Desai called out. “Contact on the tree line!” He aimed down the red dot sight of his silenced ACR. “They’re coming out of the woods!” They had all looked to confirm it.

He was right. They weren’t alone. Not anymore.

“Three.” Lieutenant Morrison had voiced aloud. “Six.” She pointed her silenced FAMAS and looked through the iron sights. “Twelve.” The woman cursed as she looked all around the park.

“15” Another member sounded.

“20.”

“Oh my God.”

‘They’re all over our flanks.”

“They’ve got us surrounded.”

“Omega Three.” Captain Russell immediately patched over to his comms. “Contact. I repeat. Enemy contact on the outer ridge.” He and the rest of his team started backing up the big field.

“Epsilon Six.” The voice over comms began cracking underneath some unseen, vast pressure.

“We are compromised.” Russell Lightbourne looked all around the trailer park now, at the outskirts that bordered it. There were shadowy figures appearing out of the woods. He saw them through his night vision goggles. “Ambush all over NSWE. Our evac is cut. Do you copy?”

Their comms crumpled underneath the weight. He couldn’t understand the response, but he was sure they could be heard. He called for help: “Phoenix is fallen. I repeat. This is a fallen phoenix.”

Then the line went dead. Radio silence.

“We’re on our own.” Captain Russell Lightbourne gritted his teeth and forced his team back further away from those advancing to their position. “Hold what you’ve got.” Sergeant Gabriel Santiago gulped down the rock that formed in his throat. His hands tightened around his M4A1 rifle.

“Captain.” Gabriel whispered. “Look.” The rest of the team saw it. A silvery animal in the distance. It approached them with galloping ease like a metallic automaton. It ambled closer.

It was a Patronus. A stag to be exact. The animal, made from clouds of silvery mist, stopped.

“Who is in command here?” The antlered deer demanded in a fierce and fiery voice. “Speak.”

Not a single member of the team answered the Patronus. Not even the captain, who eyed the ghost-like presence with distaste. This magic was cast outside the nullification zone. Figures.

“Drop your weapons.” The stag commanded. “Drop them now.” The antlered deer narrowed its ectoplasm-like eyes. “You’d be fools to resist.” It lowered its antlers and then pointed: “Do it.”

Still, no one spoke.

“I’d hate for you all to die.” The antlered Patronus deer snarled with an animalistic sneer. “But if you continue to play dumb, we'll kill you all. At this range, our magic will rip you to shreds.”

The members of the team eyed each other with a steely resolve. If this was going to be their end.

Then they would make it such an end.

“Pity.” The deer shook its head with frustration. “So be it.” It turned to make some sort of signal.

“Standfast.” Captain Russell commanded. He moved forward in front of his team, protectively.

“So, it’s you.” The stag marched its hooves towards the MACUSA captain. “Identify yourself.”

“Lightbourne, here.” Russell told the Patronus. “Captain. Team leader.”

“Captain Lightbourne, if you have any concern for the lives of your soldiers, you will order them to safety their weapons and place them on the ground.” The Patronus reared its antlered head.

“I cannot give that order.” Russell answered.

“Your unit is covered from an elevated position, Captain.” The stag told him. “Don’t be stupid.”

“Who do I have the displeasure of speaking with?” Russell Lightbourne demanded of the deer.

“Why solve the mystery so soon?” The Patronus cackled. “Half of the fun is the investigation.”

“Whoever you are.” Captain Lightbourne shook his head, regretting giving his name now. “You aren’t a part of this operation.” Russell commanded his team back up some more. They followed his lead.

“And what is this ‘operation’ that you speak of?” The Patronus questioned. “What is all of this riffraff?”

“We’re here to arrest-” Russell informed the spirit. “-a very dangerous criminal.” He looked at the figures surrounding the park. “We haven’t come for you. We’re here for someone else.”

“No, you’re here for Lorelei Tsing.” The Patronus answered with ease. “But that’s never going to happen.” The stag moved around the twelve-member MACUSA team like a predatory shark.

“So, you know.” Russell gritted his teeth. “Might I remind you, that she is guilty of eight major offenses against the Wizarding World.” The captain aimed down his rifle. “Horrendous crimes.”

“Experimentation is hardly a crime.” The stag laughed.

Russell spat: “It is when you’re doing it to the No-Maj!”

“I stand corrected.” The Patronus smiled evilly. “Do we arrest alchemists for using test subjects in their labs?”

“Are you really comparing the No-Maj to livestock?”

“We are the hunters, Captain. They are the prey.”

“These weren’t animals she tested on!” Russell’s voice rose. “They were innocent people! Men! Women! Children! Mutilated! Defiled! Twisted up into the unholiest of all hells! She did that!”

“Mudbloods aren’t people, Captain.” The Patronus sighed. “They’re less than people. They’re less than scum. Why should the wolf apologize to the sheep for slaughter? It’s a part of life.”

“She is wanted by both MACUSA and the Ministry of Magic.” Russell regained his composure and ordered: “If you are offering her asylum, I request that you cease to do so immediately.”

“Request?” The deer laughed. “This is hardly a negotiation, Captain.”

“Hand her over now.” Russell commanded: “No need for this to get bloody.”

“Oh, it’s already been heading in that direction.” The Patronus cackled: “The moment you came into my domain, without my leave, armed to the teeth.” The deer began to fade. “You sealed your fate.”

“Hold on.” Russell Lightbourne declared loudly, pointing at the deer: “Who the hell are you?”

“Ms. Tsing offered us her services-” The deer started dissipating. “-in exchange for protection.”

“And that is an agreement that we intend to honor.” The Patronus disappeared into a silvery mist of smoke. “Goodbye, Captain.” Only the voice remained. “Thank you for the conversation, dull as it was.”

“We?” Russell quietly asked.

“Oh my God.” Sergeant Gabriel Santiago had whispered in horror at the words. "This was a trap.”

“Didn’t you even ask yourself-” The Patronus’s last, remaining words gloated: “-why we left you the dead?”

And then the foghorn sounded again. Longer, deeper, and louder than ever before. It rumbled.

The world. As if an imaginary earthquake occurred with imagined aftershocks only, they felt.

“No!” Lieutenant Jade Morrison shook her head in disbelief. “This can’t be possible!”

“Captain!” Lieutenant Ryker Desai called out loudly. “We’ve got one hell of a problem!”

The doors of the trailers opened. And the dead began to walk. The first horn must have woken them. While the second gave the orders. The dead men, women, and children they’d all found.

Inferi.

They were coming from behind them.

“Contact!” Jade cried. “Visuals on the tree line!” She switched on the laser sight on her silenced FAMAS. “Ambush! Left side! THE LEFT SIDE!” The team looked left and saw that she was right.

The twenty figures that surrounded the trailer park Apparated away. And in their place. The dead came forward.

They came out of the trees now. In droves. Small groups that eventually joined into a herd. Inferi in the woods. Of course, they wouldn’t have stopped with a trailer park. There were towns nearby.

Several in fact. Many of them had series upon series of missing person cases over all the years.

How many of the dead had they hidden in the forest, waiting for them? How many people had they murdered and stowed away. Just for them to arrive? How many people had gone missing?

In those very towns.

For this very moment.

“RIGHT SIDE!” Ryker yelled. “Damn it, they’re advancing from all directions. They’re coming!”

The lieutenant pointed his silenced ACR at the other three directions, confirming the movements and locations of their enemies. It was a pincer move. With enemies on two fronts.

“Captain?” Gabriel swallowed another rock that formed in his throat. This one was twice as big as the last. “What do we do now?” He pointed his M4A1 east, west. “What’re we doing, sir?!”

“Try comms!” Russell barked the order to one of the men. “Get them back online, inform them of our situation!” He patted the shoulders of four of his soldiers. “Form up! Firing lines! Give me firing lines facing front and back!” Russell stood his ground and aimed forward. “I want accuracy! Short, controlled bursts! Single shots!” The captain shouted: “Engage the enemy!”

The MACUSA fire team followed the captain’s orders. They organized into four lines. Two faced the outside of the trailer park. Two faced the inside, where the dead came from all the trailers.

Four lines, three soldiers each.

And they fired. With the quiet shots popping out of their silenced assault rifles. Short controlled bursts of fire. Semi-automatic shots. Cool and composed. Veterans of countless missions together. Brothers and sisters in arms. Friends. Family. Put to the test. Here. Now. At the end of all things.

Their gunfire billowed out of the silenced barrels of their assault rifles in sharp, distinct pops. Puffs of smoke as if the tips of their weapons let out breaths of air. The bullets that ripped through the flesh of the Inferi were pockets of exploding smoke that popped along with the popping gunfire. They saw wounds of the undead open up on contact. Bloody mist exited the holes that appeared all over their bodies.

“Headshots!” Russell shouted to his soldiers. “Aim for the head!” He fired his TAR-21 with pinpoint preciseness. “It’s the only way!” All twelve men dropped Inferi from every direction.

One pop. Two pop. Three pop. They fell when the bullets burrowed into their flesh. But the Inferi kept moving forward. Marching on until all of their enemies were destroyed. Blood spurted out of the perforated faces and heads of the dead that they killed.

“Captain!” One of the men shouted. “The radio link is dead! I tried all the channels!” He resumed firing. “They’ve jammed our communications!” With every dead one felled by their efforts, another one moved to replace it.

“Wands!” Russell screamed. “Try your wands and get us out of here!” He’d continued firing.

Three of his men put aside their rifles and took out their wands from specialized holsters sewn into their tactical vests. They tried Apparating the twelve-man team out of harm's way. Their spells cancelled out. Two of them lit a few Inferi on fire. The third’s wand had run out of magic.

Then all three of their wands became obsolete. Some of the others tried their own wands. But the strongest spell they could conjure up was a single fire spell. It wasn’t long before they all turned useless.

“I can’t even summon a Patronus!” One of them bellowed. “I would’ve had it carry a message!”

“More of them are coming out of trees!”

“They’re all over the goddamn place!"

“There’s got to be at least a hundred of them!”

“They’re on us! They’re here!”

It was a never-ending tide of the undead. Waylaying them from two directions. Relentlessly.

Ruthlessly.

“We’re running out of room here!” Jade called out while she shot Inferi after Inferi, dropping them like they were all burlap sacks of sunflower seeds. “Damn it!” She ejected an empty magazine and turned it over so the other cartridge taped alongside it fitted into her FAMAS.

“Start moving back!” Russell commanded. “There’s more of them outside than there is inside!” He flipped a double-taped magazine of his own and inserted it into his TAR-21. “Form a wedge and go for the cracks in their numbers! Find an opening towards the trailers! Move! MOVE!”

“Loading!” Ryker screeched. He moved behind the line he was a part of and loaded another magazine into his silenced ACR. “Start moving back! Towards the trailers! THE TRAILERS!”

“Shelter!” Russell commanded his men. “Find each other and find shelter! THAT’S AN ORDER!”

“Moving!” Gabriel shouted. The sergeant popped off a couple more shots. Downing another Inferi as it reached for one of his comrades on the inside. “Go! GO!” He’d fired into the ever growing, consuming crowd of zombies. “MYLES! CONNOR! MOVE TOWARDS THE TRAILERS!”

The foghorn sounded once more. And its unholy herald of ominous purpose signaled the dead.

All of the Inferi from the woods no longer walked or shambled like the brain-dead zombies of old. Now they ran. Fast. They knew how to follow orders, how to strategize. How to hunt them.

“WEAPONS FREE!” Captain Russell Lightbourne shouted for his soldiers to act. “THEY’RE RUNNING FROM ALL DIRECTIONS!” He switched his TAR-21 to automatic fire. “FIRE AT WILL!”

The horde of undead Inferi roared with hunger. All twelve soldiers fired indiscriminately into all these newly christened hunters. Now carrying with them swift resolve and a deadly mission.

To rip. Tear. Claw. Bite. Scratch. Slash. Lacerate. Kill them all. That was their own objective.

All twelve members fired all they had. The shells from their ammo cartridges fell like a metallic waterfall. Some of the Inferi ducked, some dodged and weaved as they sprinted with grace.

The fighters were missing. They were using up precious ammunition. They were losing ground.

Gabriel Santigo sprinted away from the mess. He shouldered into an Inferi moving towards him and ran over its body. “Follow me!” The sergeant shouted as he leaped onto the side of the nearest trailer and pulled himself onto the roof. “Covering fire!” Gabriel knelt, aimed his silenced M4A1 and started spraying into the horde of Inferi. He’d mowed rows of them down.

“Follow Santiago!” Russell roared. He emptied an entire clip into a group of sprinting undead. They fell down when all of his bullets ripped through into their torsos, abdomens, and legs.

Still they rose. Still they came. Some of them even crawled. Limped. They were all still coming.

Lieutenants Ryker and Jade leaped onto the adjacent trailer next to Gabriel’s and resumed shooting. Both of them knelt for accuracy. The others. Well, some of them weren’t so lucky.

“AAAARRGGHHHHH!” Myles screamed. One of the Inferi pulled his silenced SCAR out of his hands and ripped at the straps of his tactical vest, pulling him down to the ground. A little girl with pigtails tore into his shirt and sank her bony hand into his stomach, clawing at his flesh. She started pulling his entrails, his long sausagey intestines, into her mouth and gnashed them.

He died in seconds.

“No! One, two, three, wake up! Wake me up!” Connor became surrounded by the undead. “Wait! Stop! Please stop!” But they didn't listen. He lost his FAL. They ripped the operative’s arms and legs off, and then gnawed at his stumps. “HELP ME! FOR THE LOVE OF GOD, HELP-” Russell shot him in the face. It was a mercy killing, but it didn’t feel like it. Not to him at least.

Russell moved around his comrade’s body and grabbed at the roof of Gabriel’s trailer. The sergeant stopped firing and moved to help him. “I’ve got you, sir!” Gabriel pulled the captain up. “Covering fire!” The sergeant shouted for Ryker and Jade. They dropped nearby attackers.

Their comrades died around them. Some of them were torn to pieces. Ripped to shreds. All of the Inferi had devoured the bones and cartilage and tissue that held their bodies together. One of their men stuck his Glock into his mouth when all hope seemed lost and pulled the trigger.

Another man was tackled as he tried to hide in a trailer. He managed to crawl to the propane tank beneath the stove and turned it on. The Inferi ate at him the whole way. By the time he unlatched the pin in his stun grenade, his entire lower half had been flayed and eviscerated.

The entire trailer exploded. A pillar of fire rose to the night sky, blocking out the harvest moon.

There was only the four of them left now. They were surrounded by death, smoke, and terror.

“Hold what you’ve got!” Captain Russell Lightbourne shouted. Sergeant Gabriel Santiago joined him in unloading their rifles onto the sides of the trailer, where the Inferi climbed over each other. One of the undead latched a hand onto Gabriel’s thigh and raked down with its claws.

“SHIT!” Gabriel stumbled onto the roof of the trailer. The Inferi left a gash of a wound near his knee. When it lunged towards his face, the sergeant then unloaded a clip into the Inferi’s face.

The gunfire from his silenced M4A1 shattered the Inferi’s skull into pieces. Bits of brain and bone showered all over him. He was covered in blood. They were all covered in so much blood.

There was blood everywhere. Pieces of viscera on the dirt, the trailers, and all over their gear.

When Gabriel ejected his empty magazine, he struggled to find one strapped to his vest. There were only two cartridges remaining. “I’m running low, sir!” Gabriel voiced out. He loaded up.

A grandmother of an Inferi grabbed at the stock of his M4A1. The sergeant kicked at her chest.

It didn’t help his situation. So he went for the head. He dug the hells of his boot into her jaw.

Gabriel kicked her face with his combat boot again and again. Over and over. She still held on.

“Eat this.” Captain Russell stuck the barrel of his M1911 pistol into the grandmother’s dislocated jaw.

He blew apart her face with one shot. “Get up, Santiago!” Russell shouted. “No time to die!”

The captain grasped onto the arm of the sergeant and pulled him upward to his feet. “Move!”

Lieutenants Ryker and Jade were shooting down all of the Inferi climbing over the sides of their trailer. 

“Get some!” Jade shouted. “You like it?! I bet you do!” She fired the remnants of what she had left into the undead abyss. “You want some of that?” Jade ran out and started bashing the faces of anyone she could find with the stock of her rifle. “I got plenty for all you! Come and get it!”

“Captain!” Ryker shouted. “We’re nearly out!” The never-ending Inferi swarmed the sides of both trailers. And still there was more of them. A flood of pale flesh and savage claws.

“Switch to sidearms!” Russell shouted. “Fight into your trailer!” He threw his now empty TAR-21 into the face of the nearest Inferi he could find. “Use your stun grenades! Flash and clear!”

Both lieutenants followed their captain’s orders and started to kill anything surrounding the entrance to their trailer with their Glocks. Then they flashed the inside of their trailer through the top latch and dropped down through the sun roof into the interior. And then their door closed shut from the inside. Their gunshots sounded.

“Now it’s our turn!” Gabriel shot the Inferi holding open their trailer’s door and shut it from above. Then he unlatched the sun roof of their trailer, pulled the pin of his stun grenade, and threw it in. “Flash out!” Russell fired shots from his pistol into any of the undead prying inside.

The Inferi inside were blinded by the glare and noise of the explosion. He dropped down and keeled over from the weight on his damaged knee. But Gabriel still fired his M4A1 into their faces of all the Inferi inside. When he saw that Russell followed him inside, he’d shut the roof.

The door of the trailer started to open, so Gabriel threw all of his body weight into the door and body-tackled it shut. Russell locked the door and threw anything he could find to barricade the entrance. He upended a wardrobe in front of the door and then threw stool and chair in front.

Gabriel dodged just in time when that went down.

“Look for weapons!” Russell shouted. Both he and Gabriel emptied the kitchen drawers and dumped all of the knives onto the counter. Gabriel opened the fridge and took out whatever glass bottles he could find. Russell smashed them on the counter to make them jagged sharp.

When the horde of Inferi started to slam themselves against the windows and the walls and the door of the trailer, the entire metallic shelter shifted from the weight of their actions. It rocked back and forth, left and right. Then the dead started to work as one. The trailer then moved.

In one single direction. They were trying to tip them over. So that they could get them inside.

“STOP IT!” Gabriel screamed. “LEAVE US ALONE!” He fired his M4A1 through the walls of the trailer, popping off silenced shots at any Inferi trying to muscle the shelter in one gigantically large push. The sergeant tried killing as many of the undead as possible, especially the ones trying to upend their precarious situation. “SCREW OFF!”

The propane tank dislodged itself from the stove and rolled towards the bed. Russell grabbed it, lifted it off the ground. Then he roared and threw it with all of his might through a window.

It broke through the glass and rammed into all of the Inferi outside. Gabriel kept on shooting.

When he ejected his empty cartridge and inserted his last remaining one, Russell acted. He grabbed the nearest butcher knife and sank it into the face of the next Inferi to show up in the window. One of them grabbed the captain and tried to pull him through the window. Gabriel took one of the broken bottles by the neck and rammed the jagged end into that one’s jugular.

“ALAMO!” Jade’s voice screamed from the nearby trailer. “ALAMO! ALAMO! ALAMO! ALAMO!”

“Keep fighting!” Russell shouted to them as loud as he could. “That’s an order! Fight! FIGHT!”

“No time to die, sir!” Ryker shouted over the carnage and gore around them. “No time to die!”

“Knuckle up!” Gabriel shouted. The Inferi tipped the shelter. Gabriel’s body moved sideways

Towards the kitchen counter.

He grabbed two kitchen knives there and stabbed at whatever went for the windows nearby.

Russell took a pointy vegetable peeler and buried it so far into the eye socket of one Inferi that the handle snapped off. And then the captain tried to find a fork, anything, to take its place.

That was when the arm of the werewolf ripped through part of their trailer’s wall and dug it's sharp claws into the captain’s chest. “You’ve fought bravely!” The beast roared with approval.

The massive arm of the werewolf had distinct Norse-looking runes tattooed over it. They looked familiar. “Carl Emerson!” Russell grunted out through all the pain. “The Last Mountain Man!”

“That’s enough now!” The werewolf laughed heartily. “Let's visit the bleeding hour together!”

Captain Russell Lightbourne screamed out in agony as the werewolf began closing its right fist, the claw inside of him tore through armor and flesh alike. He took out his M1911 and shot at the wrist of the enormous, hairy arm. Gabriel jabbed the barrel of his silenced M4A1 into the pectoral the arm was connected to and unloaded most of his last rifle clip into the werewolf.

Gabriel screamed as much rage as he could muster while he fired his weapon at the enormous beast. The werewolf released Russell, moving from that opening in the wall. The Inferi moved in for the kill. They crashed into each other and tripped over themselves. They toppled downward.

The sergeant dragged his captain away from the opening. Gabriel unlatched the pin from Russell’s stun grenade and threw it through the opening. The sergeant covered his captain from the blast. Then he handed off his Beretta and placed the man’s M1911 into his other hand. “I’ll be outside.” Gabriel told him. “Good luck.” He gave Russell cartridges. “It’s been an honor, sir.”

Then Gabriel led them away from the trailer. Like a shepherd leading a flock of sheep away from danger. Except they were the danger. Russell heard the last of the sergeant’s silenced M4A1 rounds popping off in the distance, shot after shot after shot, until they all but quieted.

The last time Russell ever saw Gabriel was the brave, young man hobbling away. Still firing his M4A1.

A warrior to the very end.

Inferi crawled in one at time. They tried their damndest to rip the life out of him. To eat his flesh and drink his blood. Russell wasn’t obliging them. He fired off the Beretta with his left hand. The captain shot the head of a young woman, barely nineteen. Then he shot an old man.

Looked nearly dead himself, not from being an Inferi, but from looking downright old and tired.

Anyways, he shot his face off with the M1911 in his right. Then came another and another and another. Always moving. Always chasing after the thought of killing him dead. Of ending him.

Always there. Coming towards him. Russell ejected the cartridges off both his pistols and loaded the final ones inside. And still he fought. The captain shot Inferi after Inferi. That was how he’d always wanted to be remembered. Always struggling. Always fighting. Always trying.

So, Captain Russell Lightbourne made his final stand slumped against the edge of one dirty, blood-soaked cot.

Then the trailer next to his, the one that held Ryker and Jade, exploded. It erupted into an inferno of flames and blew part of his trailer’s roof off. Russell felt shell-shocked by the destruction.

His ears wouldn’t stop ringing. But still Russell fired. He shot and shot and shot until both pistols in his hands went empty. And when the Inferi finally got to him, when one of them tried biting his face off, the captain unsheathed his combat knife and sunk it again and again into its neck.

And even when it was the end, he smiled. Because Russell tried to do right by the law and that had to count for something. For there were far too few good people and he’d wanted to be one of them. He thought of his girls. Of Simone’s warm embrace back home. And Josephine’s smile.

That was when they had arrived.

Late as usual. But stylish all the same.

Russell saw the Inferi pinning him down get headshotted from a distance. Commander Thelonious Jaha slid nearby and fired two more muffled shots from his silenced TTI TR-1 Ultralight. “Tangoes down.” The Ministry of Magic agent called: “Syd, mop up the left flank!”

“Rog.” Corporal Diana ‘Syd’ Sydney fired off silenced shots from her Colt 733 Commando. “Emori, cover my six! I’m coming in hot!” She dropped Inferi after Inferi as she moved forward.

“On it.” Sergeant Emori Vazquez called. “Wells, I’m going after this bloody lot over here. You got me?” The crack of a sniper rifle from far away blew apart an Inferi’s skull. She fired off her silenced R4-C. “Gavin. I’ve got a friendly down by the trailer on the right. Prep medical now.”

“We’re coming your way.” The roar of a helicopter’s blades soared overhead. Beams of light combed the destroyed landscape and showered his battered, broken body with warm safety.

The sound of muffled shots popping off all over the area was music to Russell’s ears. He stared down at his chest wound and found a series of gaping streaks of bloody, ruined skin and flesh.

“What took you so long?” Russell choked out blood when Lieutenant Gavin O’Connell got to him and his fellow warriors formed a perimeter defense. “Marcus.” The dying captain grabbed at the tan-skinned soldier’s tactical vest. “Where is Marcus?” Russell coughed out some more.

“Don’t talk.” Gavin pressed gauze against the open hole in his chest. “Save your strength now.”

“WHERE.” Russell struggled to pull the lieutenant close to him. “IS.” He coughed out some more blood. “KANE?” The blood flowed more freely out his chest and his mouth this time around.

“The red is supposed to stay inside of you, mate.” Gavin shook his head and began dressing the ravaged chest wound as best he could. “And Kane?” The man shrugged. “He refused to come.”

“Why?”

“Retired.”

“Retired?” Russell heaved out what looked to be part of his guts. “That supposed to be a joke?”

“Commander!” Gavin called out in alarm. “He hasn’t got long!” Commander Jaha joined him.

“Russell.” Jaha looked sad. He clasped the dying captain’s forearm with his own forearm.

“Jaha.” Russell croaked. “My men.” His body started to shake, trembling with rough suffering.

“You were the only one we could find.” Thelonious said morosely. “We searched all over.”

In a rush of desperation, Russell told them about the twenty figures outside the trailer park. The malevolent stag Patronus that taunted them all. And the fog horn that caused the chaos.

“Protection?” Jaha turned to Gavin. “Who do we know with that much leverage to hide Tsing?”

Gavin shrugged, looking to his other team members. All around them. They shook their heads.

“Our intelligence was off.” Russell warned him as best he could. “Information got leaked.”

The dying captain grabbed as much as of the commander’s tactical vest as he could grab.

“They knew we were coming.” Russell shook his head with remorse. “It was a trap, Jaha.”

“How could this have happened?” Jaha questioned him quietly. “Our boneyard was empty.”

“Wanted to kill off our joint operation.” Russell whispered. “Flip of a damn coin. You or us.”

Russell felt tears leaving his eyes and streaking down his face. “It was us.” His lips quivered.

“The Wallaces escaped our pursuit.” Jaha informed him. “But when we didn’t hear from you.”

“You feared the worst.” Russell laughed. “Right.” He felt every second of his life ticking away.

“If there’s a leak within our forces...”

“...then we have a traitor in our midst.”

“Your side or mine?”

“I don’t know.”

“The Primes Emergent.” Jaha said. “Can we trust them?”

“No choice.” Russell told him: “I’m a Prime too, ‘member?”

“He asked after Kane.” Gavin told Jaha, the dark-skinned man’s eyes widened. “But I told him-”

“Retired.” Russell coughed and laughed at the same time; what a slow death. “Say it isn’t true.”

“Afraid so.” Jaha told him softly. “Ever since the incident at Hogwarts. His priorities changed.”

“That damn boy has softened him up.” Gavin shook his head with disgust. “He quit on us all.”

“His son.” Russell snarled at the lieutenant. “That’s his son.” He jabbed at Gavin. “Watch it.”

Gavin looked at Russell and, all of a sudden, looked ashamed. He nodded and turned to Jaha: “We need healing magic.” He pointed at the wound. “We have to move him to where we can-”

“No time.” Russell felt the light fading from his body. “Find Marcus. Tell him Emerson is back.”

Syd and Emori helped Jaha and Gavin lift him atop a stretcher and moved towards the chopper.

“Carl Emerson?” Jaha replied with shock. “The Last Mountain Man?” He shook his head. “He’s supposed to be dead.” The roar of the helicopter started to take over the surrounding sounds.

“We hurt him.” Russell ignored Jaha’s statement. “Gabriel and I.” He started to die. “Find him.”

“How?” Gavin asked.

“Have Marcus track him.” Russell saw darkness behind his eyes. “He’s the only one who can.”

“Is that true?” Gavin turned to Jaha.

“It is.” Commander Jaha had nodded slowly. “He’s fought against him throughout the years.”

“The words, Jaha.” Russell pleaded. “Please. The words.”

And then he was dead. Captain Russell Lightbourne had coughed no more. Suffered no more.

They managed to get him on the chopper. And as it rose with all of them inside. They said it.

The sacred words. The ones always said for fallen warriors in battle. Together. As one. Always.

“In peace.” Jaha whispered. “May you leave this shore.”

“In love.” Syd then said softly: “May you find the next.”

“Safe passage on your travels.” Emori returned.

Wells joined in their creed: “Until our final journey.”

“To the ground.” Gavin finished for them all to join:

“May we meet again.” The remaining fighters said.

And as the helicopter moved over the horizon.

Towards a rising sun. Red as the day's violence.

They left this place behind for better tomorrows.


	5. Honor Among Thieves...

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Bellamy builds bridges...

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> " Turnin' " by Young Rising Sons

During the early morning hours of that very same Saturday, while the sun had broken through the clouds in the sky with its fiery golden dawn, something else was happening countries away.

In the far northernmost reaches of Scandinavia. Somewhere between icy Norway and cold Sweden. A couple leagues west of Durmstrang Castle. Miles away from the Institute’s grounds.

Within the woods. Among junipers and spruces that stood tall as giants. Alongside moss-covered rocks; where the mist infested the thin spaces between those trees in this meridian of wilderness.

A surrogate father was teaching his surrogate son how to hunt; they woke when it was still dark.

And the two of them had been moving ever since, covering ground and following after tracks.

They knelt inside low-cut hedges of dew-covered thistles and bog myrtles, along the fern-ridden grove that wrapped around the outer border of that particular magical, Gothic European school.

The boy wore long, charcoal black Adidas pants with zippers that clung to his ankles, a navy-blue thermal hoodie, a grey woolen beanie, and a pair of crimson and yellow Saucony running shoes. Both of the boy's hands were covered up by sleek black gloves with padded knuckles.

The man's bulging muscles, rougher than rocks, rippled out of his black, long-sleeved shirt. He had on dusky jeans with steel-tipped work boots, tanner than two Timberlands, and wore rough, work gloves lined with elk hide. They both had primer straps that had covered both of his wrists.

He glanced at the MTM Vulture tactical watch made from 316L stainless steel on his right hand.

They still had a great deal of time before the others woke back in camp.

Both of them held longbows made out of moonwood. Pale as milk, harder than wrought iron, and flexible just like bamboo. Quivers filled with red pine arrows fletched from turkey feathers were strapped along the back of their waists. They gulped up cotton-like, fresh smoky mountain air.

For the current temperature in this specific Scandinavian nook was that of an icy, morning chill.

Even though it was midsummer, the cold was an unforgiving leech because this one location was that far up in the north. The real north. Where the cold dug trench lines inside all of your bones.

As if Old Man Winter gripped the entire landscape with those alabaster-knuckled fists of his and refused to let go so that when Lady Spring made her rounds around the world and saw him, she feigned ignorance. Not that she feared confrontation, but because such a battle was unwinnable.

But not in the way you’d expect. Summer warmth was as inevitable as the coming of bleak winter. They’d forever be locked in a stalemate. An old, eternal clash between sun and snow.

This battle dated as far back as the greatest and most archaic of struggles: light versus darkness.

The man held his bow steady with one hand off to the side of himself. It was the boy who held his bow forward. He inserted an arrow into the nock locator and grunted softly as he stretched back the string of his weapon. The boy aimed his bow in front at an unseen target from far away.

“Relax your bow arm.” The man advised the boy in a soft voice. “You’re too stiff. Loosen up.”

The boy nodded; he lessened at that pressure and closed one of his eyes for better line of sight.

His prey, the one that they’d been tracking for a while now, was a snark. An unhealthy mix between a rabbit, squirrel, skunk, and porcupine. Except it didn’t look like any of those animals.

It was a magical beast covered in fur and thin, translucent spikes; it also had long puckery teeth.

The spikes were mainly for show; if you brushed fingers alongside it, it’d tickle rather than hurt.

Snarks were parasites in this neck of the woods. They latched onto trees and stole their nutrients.

The woods declared that the snarks were enemies of the forest. So, the trees called for a culling.

These thieving little shits were fair game now.

And you heard right.

All of the trees, in this part of the world adjacent to the Durmstrang Institute, were indeed alive.

The forest hosted all sorts of conversations. The woods were sentient. They joked and lectured.

What they loved to do, out of all those things, was to hold discussions. Similar to conferences.

They spoke about the world. Old topics. New subjects for debate. They’d resembled professors.

Who liked hearing themselves talk with all their low, rumblings of incoherent moans and groans, the swaying of branches, the stretching of their trunks, and the shaking of leaves, nuts, and fruit.

Their language was an ancient one. Older than rock and water and sky and the whispering wind.

But most of all, more important than anything else, they decided what game was worth hunting.

If you killed something that wasn’t in season or if you struck down a beast that was endangered.

Then the hunters were hunted. For the woods in this part of the world had an unforgiving streak.

Especially when it came to all of the things living inside of their realm. Under their protection.

Anyways, the snark in question, the one they’d been tracking, fed off the trunk of a beech tree.

“Steady your breath.” The man quietly commanded. “When you’re ready. Hold it and release.”

“Okay.” The boy whispered back. He then inhaled slowly and held it in the center of his chest.

Not yet. He thought to himself as he peered through his remaining open eye. Not yet. The feathered end of his arrow lightly touched his chin as he pulled the string further back. Not yet.

The snark raised its bug-eyed face from the bark of the tree and sniffed the air with its rat-like whiskers and buck teeth. Bellamy had slightly hesitated. Did something that ugly deserve to die?

Then he remembered all the dead and decaying trees that he and his father passed on their way here. They deserved better.

Everything loosed all at once. All of the boy’s doubts, his breath, and the sharpness of his arrow.

It cut through the air and flew towards the furry parasite attached to the beech tree. But instead of piercing the flesh of that magical pest, the red pine shaft of the arrow shattered against the wood.

The snark, having seen parts of its free-loading existence flash before its eyes, let out a hiss of a howl, and scampered away through the foliage of the trees, now gilded with the morning’s light.

“Such fucking-” The boy cursed aloud and knocked the recurve of his bow against his forehead and so that some of his messy black hair plopped out from the sides of his beanie. “-bullshit!”

“Bellamy.” The man gave him a stern look as he shook disapprovingly: “We talked about this.”

Bellamy Blake winced at the man’s disappointment. “My bad.” His brows furrowed as he tried remembering the rules. “Bad language is bad manners!” Then the boy started sprinting forward.

Before his guardian had a chance to respond. The man opened his mouth, but then closed it just as quickly. Marcus Kane stared after the boy running at full speed. Then he closed his eyes when Bellamy tripped over a rock and fell; he’ll never get used to all the energy inside the boy's body.

“Where did that come from?” Bellamy grunted as he picked himself back up. He glowered at the rock before dusting himself off and walking towards the beech tree and his broken arrow. “I could’ve sworn I had it.” The Gryffindor frowned at the remains of his shot and let out a sigh.

“It takes a long time to get good with a bow.” Kane strolled after the boy: “Keep practicing.”

He watched the Muggleborn boy, with his tan, freckled skin and messy, black hair, as he lightly touched the area on the beech tree where his arrow hit; the boy softly rubbed and patted the spot.

“Sorry about that.” Bellamy had murmured to the tree. “I didn’t mean to miss the little bugger.”

Marcus Kane felt something warm spelunk in the pit of his stomach as he observed the interaction. It had been quite a while since he’d felt something like that: a long, long, long while.

The beech tree let out a soothing groan and moaned its appreciation at the two of them. Both the man and the boy went on their way whilst waving their goodbyes at the sentient pillar of wood.

His guardian led the way. The Gryffindor boy followed after him. No words were spoken then.

Bellamy stared at the broad shoulders of the man in front of him. Marcus Kane looked like a medium-sized drink. He was a very powerful man. In tremendous shape despite being forty-eight years of age, with long legs, sinewy arms and a stocky-looking, intimidating build. Marcus had long, lustrous hair the color of burnt bronze. All of it rolled down his head in such wavy lengths.

But it was his face that stood out. Marcus Kane had different-colored eyes instead of a normal set. He once told Bellamy that it was something called: “Heterochromia.” One pupil was dark amethyst. The other one was pale yellow, an amber-like cross between orange and red similar to a hawk’s, and there were scars. Quite a lot. His entire face was a tapestry of hard-fought battles.

There was a jagged old cut that went down his right eye, from the forehead all the way to the chin. A lengthy-looking horizontal scar ran right through the middle of his nose towards the contours of his left cheek. There a series of smaller ones, nicks and notches near his lower jaw.

Kane had a rough stubble of a short-boxed beard that covered up most of those faded markings.

That was just his face; there were plenty more throughout his body. Bellamy knew that much.

Marcus Kane never talked to the boy about where or how he received these mementoes of pain.

And Bellamy never thought to ask. To be honest, his surrogate father didn’t look all that bad.

The boy noticed the man still getting looks from women when they walked down Diagon Alley. While Kane pulled out his wallet to pay for the boy’s school supplies, Bellamy saw the effects his guardian had on them. They’d check on him from the corner of their eyes and whispered amongst their friends in hushed tones. Bellamy had mentioned this to Kane as they both walked.

“Really?” Marcus analyzed the parchment that listed all of the boy’s necessary school materials. “I hadn’t noticed.” He seemed more concerned with finding all the items Bellamy would need for a second year at Hogwarts. Kane tucked Galleons and Sickles back in his bottomless wallet.

“That woman kept laughing.” The Gryffindor frowned, furrowing his brows in deep thought: “Even though you didn't say any jokes.” The very concept of flirting was still unknown to him.

“Where is Madam Malkin's Robes for All Occasions?” Kane muttered. He looked up and down the narrow alley of magical shops: “Did it move?” The man looked vexed: “Thanks for the bloody warning.” Bellamy ticked another finger: “And that barista spilled coffee all over you.”

“People make mistakes, Bellamy.” Kane hailed a nearby wizard and asked about the whereabouts of the place in question. The thin, weasel-looking man muttered, “Piss off”, and kept walking. Marcus narrowed his mixed eyes; his face darkened. He fantasized about throttling the rude piece of shit asshole who breathed on him just now.

“It didn’t look like one. She didn’t look sorry in the slightest. I think she wanted to touch you.”

“Bastard.” The man cursed quietly under his breath. "I'll put your head on a goddamn spike.”

“Why’re we looking for this store?” Bellamy questioned Kane, when he noticed his expression.

The man shook himself out of his sick, gruesome thoughts. His attention returned to the boy.

“You’re growing too fast.” Kane brushed at the hem of Bellamy’s shirt: “This size barely fits.”

Then the Gryffindor boy widened his hazel eyes and pointed straight ahead. “I think I found it!”

“Where?” The man turned to where Bellamy pointed: “No, that’s Quality Quidditch Supplies.”

“How can we be sure?” The messy, black-haired boy smiled toothily: “Unless we investigate?”

Marcus Kane shook his head at Bellamy Blake and that shit-eating grin he had on, before blinking his eyes rapidly and rocking his head left to right as if to say ‘what’s the harm?’ Then he’d said: “We’ll browse, okay?” He watched the boy sprint madly inside before softly chuckling, shrugging, and following him indoors. Bellamy still remembered that day fondly.

It made him feel good, having such a cool and awesome Dad. It almost made him feel like he belonged here in this magical world filled with witches, wizards, monsters, and the supernatural.

“I’m glad you’re back.” Bellamy whispered to Kane. He gently plunked his head against the man’s arm as they strolled through the gloomy forest. The man let off a sliver of a rueful smile.

“So am I.” Kane lightly elbowed Bellamy’s shoulder so that he stumbled a few steps to the right.

“Where did you go?” The boy had asked the man.

The man responded: “I had to tie some loose ends.”

“You mean like there was a rope?”

Kane widened his eyes at Bellamy, but when he saw how sincere the question was, he snickered.

“No, it’s an expression.” The man furrowed his own brows as he tried to simplify what such a statement meant to a young boy; he found that these moments were endless: “I finished a thing.”

“What kinda ‘thing’?” Bellamy always had a curious streak when it came to his father’s affairs.

“Nothing to worry yourself over.” Marcus waved the conversation away. “Let’s keep tracking.”

They quickly started crouch-walking through the reeds and bushes of the woods around them.

Kane and Bellamy held their own moonwood recurve bows by the padded grips as they moved.

Both of them continued searching the forest for signs of their little friend. The snark scrambled off in one hell of a hurry. But if there was one thing that was certain about its wretched biology.

It was that its hunger trumped over common sense; the beast couldn’t help finding another host.

“Here.” Kane slid underneath an overturned log propped up by two miniature boulders. The fallen tree slanted at such an angle that they could see its hanging moss: “Tell me what you see.”

Bellamy surveyed the scene with his hazel eyes. He recalled the lessons that his guardian had lectured to and modeled for him throughout the entire summer. It was hard, pain-staking work at first. He sucked big time. The Gryffindor boy made careless mistake after thoughtless mistake.

However, if there was one thing that Marcus Kane mastered over the years, it was patience. Patience towards the young boy’s impulsive recklessness. Patience towards his inability to concentrate for long periods of time or follow basic rudimentary instructions. Pure and utter saint-like patience. In a way, Bellamy’s protector had reminded him a lot of Harper McIntyre.

She was patient too. And she dealt with a lot of his shenanigans. More so than Roan, who always acted on his best behavior when she was around. But whenever Bellamy teased her or got on her nerves during her lessons, even when her face reddened like the apples that cinnamon-spiced cider was made from, even when her shoulders began trembling, Harper never gave up on him.

That was how they caught up with other kids in terms of magic: thanks to the wild, chestnut-haired girl with emerald eyes behind thick glasses that went askew whenever she moved her face quickly, who bit her bottom lip when she was either focused or unsure of something.

Harper dragged Bellamy and Roan through their first year. She singlehandedly saved their asses

It was the same with Kane. He weathered every mishap and profanity-filled storm. Over time, throughout the days, weeks, and months that followed, Bellamy found he was improving. Not by a lot. He still screwed up. But he was getting better at hunting. Tracking. Slowly, but surely.

“A snark moved through here.” Bellamy touched the log's bark with his fingertips, where tiny claw marks were embedded into the moist, rotten wood. “And then another.” He traced the path.

From one end of the log all the way down to the next part; Bellamy had run his fingers against it. Marcus watched as young boy had narrowed his eyes and patted his fingers along the dead tree.

“It came to warn its pal.” The Gryffindor boy pointed at a distinct smattering of claw marks. “There's too many prints for a single animal.” He poked at an intersection: “Their tracks cross.”

Bellamy crouched under the log and smoothed his palm on the moss covering its undergrowth; there were a few indentured marks there. “They both went in this direction.”

Kane smiled softly as the boy then sank onto the forest floor and probed the nearby vegetation, all of those patches of flowers and weeds and thickets of thorny thistles, with his gloved hands.

“They crawled.” Bellamy reported. “Low to the dirt.” He’d knee-walked: “For cover. Safety.”

There was a long stretch of silence. The man observed the boy as he quietly scanned the area.

It was a long while before either one of them spoke.

But when one of them did; it was a welcome word.

The boy had turned to the man with a miserable look: “They knew we were coming this way!”

“How?” Kane already knew the answer to the question. But he wanted to see if Bellamy knew.

“The tracks pick up.” Bellamy pointed at some impressions. “Plenty of space between strides.”

“What alerted them of our presence?”

“They must have felt the vibrations of our footsteps.”

“Why is that?”

“Snarks have extremely sensitive skin on the lining of their stomachs.” Bellamy patted his own belly for equal measure. “That’s why their bellies are such a delicacy.” He’d said: “They’re like bacon.” Marcus Kane nodded: “Don’t lose it.” He then gestured towards the west: “Show me.”

The boy excitedly nodded and took off, fast as usual. The man then steadily followed after him.

Bellamy led Kane on a merry chase throughout the vast interior of the forest beset by trees in all directions. They weaved through large expanses of rock-filled terrain that resembled minefields.

They moved in synchronized motions. Both of them spent many a camping trip, many a hunt.

Together.

As both mentor and pupil in the great outdoors. Sometimes in Canada and sometimes in Russia.

There were a few times when Kane took Bellamy to some of the States; but they always returned here. In this particular forest in this particular neck of the Eastern European world; always here.

For it was home to the both of them. They were approaching the end of the snarks’ tracks now.

“Quietus.” The man muttered when the boy neared the designated spot. Bellamy slid behind the trunk of a silver birch. Kane crept behind him and gripped the side of the tree so he could see.

The spell worked its magic; they couldn’t be heard; all their movements were masked in silence.

They scanned the tree tops above them. Looking from left to right, to up and down. Searching.

It took a while. Just like it always did.

But eventually they saw the scenario.

“Over there.” Bellamy said hoarsely. “Far left.” And then he slid an arrow out from the quiver behind him. The boy notched it into his moonwood recurve bow’s string. “Upon that yew tree.”

“I only see the one.” Kane mumbled. “Where is the other?”

“Long gone.” Bellamy whispered: “This one stayed behind.”

“Why would it do that?”

“To die in its stead.”

“What is the reason for this sacrifice?”

“Snarks are one conglomerate.” The boy recited from the bestiary: “They’re a series of pawns to a single hivemind.” He stretched his arm back so that the sharp arrowhead went near his knuckle.

“Then it doesn’t matter which one escapes and which one stays.” The man finished the thought.

“One alive is better than two dead.”

“Simple arithmetic.”

“They call it ‘maths’ over here.”

“This only works if you hit your mark.”

“I know.”

“Focus.” Kane advised. “Keep your elbow high.” He patted the underside of Bellamy’s arm. The boy followed his lead. “You want your back to do the heavy lifting.” The man tapped his spine. The boy tightened the space between his shoulder blades. “Take your time. Watch your form.”

Bellamy closed his left eye, but kept his right wide open; he steadied his breathing and aimed.

“Don’t think of it as an animal.” Kane had whispered. “It's just another target. Clear your mind.”

The boy tried not to think about right or wrong. Tried not to think about how cold it was or how dark it had been when they first set off. Tried not to think about how happy he was about this.

About having someone watching over him. Taking care of him. Finally, after all this time.

“Ready yourself.” Marcus Kane said in a low voice. “Breathe in. Exhale. And then release.”

Bellamy kept his grip solid. He inhaled through his nostrils and then held it. He held it. Held it.

Held it some more.

And simultaneously with the emptying of all the air in both his lungs did he release his hold on the arrow so that the narrow shaft of red pine flew. It turned out his aim was true. The arrow hit.

It pierced through the side of the snark. The furry parasite yelped with pain and crashed onto the ground. Bellamy didn’t wait for Kane’s command. He sprinted full speed towards the pest flopping around the dirt in excruciating pain. Its cries were high-pitched and unsettling to hear.

Bellamy immediately slid towards the suffering snark, tightly gripped its head in his wound fist, and then quickly, mercifully twisted. Its neck snapped with a loud crack; like breaking a stick.

By the time the man thought to follow after the boy, the snark was long gone, dead in his hands.

Then Bellamy Blake looked towards Marcus Kane. Awaiting criticism, hoping for his approval.

Kane took in the sight before him. Bellamy had been working towards this moment all summer. He bemoaned all the near misses and threw fits over the close call hits that weren’t meant to be.

But right now. After all this time. It had finally paid off. It was the boy’s first ever hit. First kill.

Marcus Kane knelt down in front of Bellamy Blake. He gripped the boy’s shoulder with his right hand. And then gently shook the Gryffindor: “Well done.” Kane smiled with pride at Bellamy.

Bellamy had never felt happier than he did at that very moment. He tugged his beanie off so the sweat that gathered at his scalp cooled in the cold air; then he ruffled his wet, messy, black hair.

And he smiled back at his father with such a feeling of accomplishment. Bellamy pulled out a roll of twine from his pocket. He started tying an end into a complex knot.

Marcus pulled off one of his elk hide gloves, wrenched the arrow out, and dipped his fingers into the bloody wound. Then the man turned the boy to face him before marking his tan forehead.

“You’ve got to wear its blood.” Marcus told the boy in a hushed tone.

Bellamy winced right as the cold blood had touched his skin: “Why?”

“To honor it.”

“Honor?”

“You’re the reason why it’s gone.” Kane said. “Remember what you take.”

“I will, Dad.” Bellamy then nodded his head right back at him: “I promise.”

The boy tied a cord around the snark with the twine he had and tightened it around his waist so that it hung. Bellamy signaled to Marcus Kane that he was ready for the return journey. And as the man started leading the way back, he heard some commotion. Kane turned; his jaw dropped.

“LET’S GO!” Bellamy whooped at the top of his lungs; the Gryffindor boy, now brimming with pent-up excitement, bolted to the yew tree. “Did you see that shot?! It was like: BAM! BAM!”

Kane watched the yew tree sway its branches up and down at all of the hype. Its trunk shifted left to right in a victory-like cha-cha dance. Bellamy laughed aloud at that and threw his beanie high up into the air; it plopped a couple of yards away on the ground from their celebration.

“I can’t believe that just worked!” The Gryffindor boy raised one hand: “Come on, big fella! Come on!” When the yew tree bowed and gently high-fived him with its branches: “YEAH!!!!!”

The man watched the boy begin to absolutely lose his mind, hyperventilating with joy and glee.

“That’s what I’m talking about!” Bellamy started dancing wildly. “Sayonara, bad luck!” He placed his moonwood bow between his legs and then ‘yeeee-hawed' like a bucking bronco rider.

Marcus Kane pinched the bridge of his nose. He had forgotten that Bellamy was still twelve-years old. “We must protect this house!” The boy hooted as he rode on by atop his recurve bow.

Several minutes later. After Bellamy quieted down just a bit and Kane shushed him again and again until he’d reached some form of calmness, the pair of them started walking back.

The Gryffindor boy still felt a little breathless. He had cleared his throat and quietly apologized.

“I don’t know what came over me.” Bellamy’s cheeks were red. “It must’ve been like a spell.”

It was the dumbest, stupidest lie of all time. Kane stared blankly at the boy who rubbed his neck with embarrassment and shrugged, nonchalantly fibbing: “Some kind of magic or something.”

Marcus Kane shook his head at the ward who he had taken in. With every day that passed, the Gryffindor boy never ceased to surprise him; the man learned something new every time.

They walked mostly in silence, admiring the reverence of the woods around them. Of the world.

Both man and boy breathed in the fresh, cold mountain air; their breaths wafted in front of them.

“Did you speak with Mister Jaha?” Bellamy asked: “When you went to tie all your loose ends?”

Marcus widened his different-colored eyes and quickly turned towards the boy who stared back.

“The two of you fought over this summer.” The Gryffindor said: “I heard you both arguing.”

“You mean you’ve eavesdropped-” Kane then looked suspicious: “-on private conversations.”

“It isn’t really ‘eavesdropping’-” Bellamy continued on, unafraid: “-if your voice carries over.”

“How?” The man couldn’t understand that part: “We cast Silencing charms outside your tent.”

“That only works if I stay in the tent.” The boy answered: “Which I may or may not have done.” Bellamy rocked his weight left, right; he had looked like the guiltiest of suspects. “Allegedly.”

“Bellamy-”

“I know he didn’t want you to take me in. Back at the start.”

The silence that followed that sentence was an uncomfortable one. Kane felt as if the wind got knocked out of him. It was true. All of it. One time, after visiting Bellamy in St. Mungo’s, Thelonious Jaha stood in the shadowy corner of the hallway and confronted him: “What are you doing?” Kane had finished reading Bellamy a book.

Thelonious Jaha had been keeping tabs on Marcus Kane. When the man visited the boy several times throughout those coming months. Kane read a great many stories to Bellamy, sometimes using his magic for visuals. And he didn’t know why it was that way. He didn’t know what.

He was doing. The boy was a person of interest. A suspect in a magical cold murder case. With a missing sister, who they suspected was kidnapped. They were waiting for his memory to return.

So, they could store it in a pensieve before mind-wiping him with the Memory Charm ‘Obliviate’. At the moment it was too shattered to probe through for suspects, for any details.

That had always been the plan.

Their correspondence with Bellamy was only supposed to be temporary. But Kane grew attached. He ‘felt’ things. He felt responsible for the boy; he was the one who found him after all.

Wandering the streets of Polis. Covered in blood and calling out for: “Octavia” again and again.

The experienced, veteran warrior wanted to keep him safe. And it felt...good. Feeling that way.

"This needs to stop." Jaha firmly told Kane: "You're not to see him again, Marcus."

"Or what?" Kane quietly challenged, his mismatched eyes hardened towards Jaha.

Jaha was furious when Kane adopted him. After the two of them discovered that he was capable of magic. After he’d created a paper family. The Commander wanted to throw him into an orphanage or magical foster care. Marcus Kane rejected that. He refused.

But how Bellamy knew about that was beyond him.

“How did you hear about that?” The man asked.

The boy answered: “I heard you outside my room when we were in that magic hospital.”

“You’ve been doing a lot of that lately, haven’t you? Listening.”

“Am I wrong?”

“That wasn’t his decision to make.” Kane didn’t give a shit what anyone else thought. “It was my call.” The Auror still remembered the words he used to threaten Jaha all that time ago.

If the Commander tried to have something done to Bellamy without his knowledge. Without his leave.

Then they would have words.

Jaha may be his superior officer.

But Marcus was the boogeyman.

And Kane would feed Jaha his fucking heart if he tried to keep the Auror from seeing the boy. 

“Is it because I’m a Muggle?” Bellamy had quietly asked.

“No.” Kane’s mouth and throat felt dry: “That’s not why.”

“There are people out there who don’t like Muggles.” The boy said: “They call us Mudblood-”

“Where did you hear that?!” The man spat angrily. “Did someone call you that in Hogwarts?”

Bellamy shrugged and looked down at the ground. Kane knew he wouldn’t answer him. Even though in the boy’s mind, there was a certain blonde-haired girl that he used to know who said it. At first, they hadn’t known the truth about each other. She had been his friend once upon a time.

Or she used to be. He didn’t really know what she was now. Bellamy missed her. He knew that.

Even after all of the horrible things she’d done. To the people Bellamy cared about. He still did.

“You are Muggleborn, yes.” The man tried saying in a calm voice: “But you don’t let anyone say that word.” Kane then lightly pointed his finger at Bellamy’s chest: “Never call yourself that.”

“It’s true, though.” Bellamy said: “About Mister Jaha. He doesn’t like me. This is all my fault.”

Marcus Kane wanted to say more about the m-word, but quickly stopped himself. He closed his eyes, sighed, and stopped in his tracks. The man pulled Bellamy off to the side; the boy had on an inquisitive look. “What’d you hear?” Kane took off his elk hide gloves and knelt to Bellamy’s level. “Tell me the truth.” The boy’s protector said solemnly: “It’s alright. I won’t get angry.”

Bellamy checked Kane’s mismatched eyes to see if they held the truth; he couldn’t really tell.

But the boy spoke up all the same.

“Well ‘you’re losing focus’ and-” The Gryffindor tried to remember all of the things he had heard: “-that ‘it couldn’t have come at a worse time’.” Kane had quietly cursed his carelessness.

He should’ve checked that Bellamy was asleep. He should’ve had that talk far, far away from him. There were all these things Kane could’ve, should’ve, would’ve done now that he knew.

That Bellamy knew.

“Mister Jaha said: ‘You’re our strongest fighter’ and-” Bellamy carried on: “-‘we can’t afford to lose you’ and-” The boy furrowed his brows even more: “-then he said: ‘How can you leave us now?’ and that’s all, I think.” His hazel eyes widened before adding: “He kept asking ‘why’?”

Kane tightened his hands into fists. He looked down at the ground with such a heated stare, it felt like his eyes were burrowing beneath the soil. The man didn’t know how to smooth all this out.

“What’s going on?” Bellamy asked quietly. “Are we in trouble?”

“No.” Kane smiled, gently shaking his head to reassure him: “Nothing is wrong. Nothing at all.”

“Are you sure?” The boy didn’t look convinced in the slightest: “Maybe I can help fix it.”

“NO!” The man’s eyes lit up with fury, but he quickly caught himself: “No, this is my business.” He pointed to himself: “Not yours.” Kane felt ashamed of his initial reaction: “This is mine and mine alone.” The man didn’t want the boy to see that side of himself. The side that hurt others.

“Oh.” Bellamy looked disappointed. He always wanted a chance to prove himself to his guardian. To help out in any way he can. In whatever capacity: “Is it true?” The boy questioned.

“Is what true?”

“Are you the ‘strongest fighter’ they have?”

“No, I’m not. Not by a long shot or a mile. He’s just exaggerating.”

“Mister Jaha looked serious when he said that. He practically shouted it.”

“There are far more capable fighters out there than me. I should know. I’ve trained them all.”

“Just like ‘He’ trained you.” Bellamy’s hazel eyes lit up with excitement: “The Chosen One!”

“That’s enough now.” Kane stood back up and gestured for the boy to follow him. “Let’s go.”

“Dad!” The Gryffindor boy groaned. "When are you going to tell me about Mr. Potter?”

“In time.” Marcus Kane buried Harry’s memory further in the back of his mind. “Bellamy.” He wasn’t the only pupil. There was another. “In time.” They were the deadliest of partners. A duo.

The man and the boy resumed their journey back. They stopped by an immensely tall spruce that had a branch which held two rucksacks. Kane and Bellamy shouldered their respective bags and kept on moving. Their packs had rations, a canteen of water each, and a variety of other tools.

They traded off their moonwood bows and quivers of red pine arrows so that they hung instead.

Kane took out his leather handled KA-BAR knife of blackened, serrated steel from his rucksack and tucked the sheath that held it into the rear waistband of his dark, navy jeans. The two kept on walking their way back.

“Harper’s sister is training to be an Auror.” Bellamy said: “She’s studying hard at the Academy.”

“That’s nice.” Kane stepped on bushels of thorns so the boy could cross over them safely: “Good for her.”

“Do you think you’ll train her?” Bellamy asked.

Kane grimaced before answering: “I hope not.”

“Why do you say that?”

“She’s just starting out. I doubt I’ll see her. The initiates I used to train had to be the very best.”

“How come?”

“Because they had to come with me into very dangerous places.”

“Hold on. Wait a minute.” The boy halted: “You went to very dangerous places?!”

“Not anymore.” The man eased his left hand towards him for calm: “I’ve stopped doing that.”

“Why?” Bellamy seemed to really like the word ‘why’. He asked his guardian that word a lot.

Kane stared hard at the Gryffindor boy: “There are more important things than fighting.” Then he held his own jaw and cracked his neck left to right: “All I do now is teach. I’m a teacher.”

“I thought you said you were a ‘consultant’.”

“What’s the difference?”

“I don’t know.”

“There isn’t any, Bellamy. Honestly, there isn’t.”

“Are you happy?” The boy asked: “With your new job?”

Kane looked at Bellamy, really looked at him. “I am.” The scarred man had replied: “It’s safer.”

They walked on in silence. But then Bellamy, as usual, couldn’t contain himself. He spoke up:

“Well, Dad! You never know-” The Gryffindor insisted: “-Harper’s sister may be the best out of her whole class!” Kane then considered that possibility and nodded: “I’ll take your word for it.”

“You’ll see when we arrive at McIntyre farm!” Bellamy smiled: “Everyone’s going to be there!”

“Are you excited for the match?” Kane already knew the answer. But he wanted to hear it all from him. The boy jumped up and down as he told his guardian about all the wild theories that he, Roan, and Nate overheard. But he was confident that Eliza Morley would catch the Snitch. “Win or lose. The Red Sparrow always prevails!” Bellamy shoved a triumphant fist into the air.

Marcus Kane shook his head at the Quidditch-obsessed Gryffindor. Never in his wildest dreams did he predict the Muggleborn boy’s intense passionate love for the magical sport. Or his surprising aptitude at Flying. When Bellamy had been taken away from Hogwarts, he flew a lot.

When word had gotten back to him, Kane was resting in a ditch, outside of Uzbekistan, geared up with an assault kit: multi-camouflaged clothes and boots underneath a tactical vest fitted with various ammunition cartridges, grenades, and that very same KA-BAR knife strapped to his chest. He had just finished assassinating a vampire and massacring the rest of its thralls. A silenced Heckler & Koch HK416 with an ACOG laid across his chest. He had only used up a single magazine. All thirty rounds found their targets. Kane didn’t even have to use his wand. The black ops soldier had located and disabled all of the rune marks at the time. But he wanted to see if he could complete the mission without magic. Marcus found out he was able to do just that.

The scarred man was smoking a cigar from Credenhill. Marcus received a box of the stuff, a gift from the boys at Hereford. He twirled his timber wolf bone wand through the fingers of his left hand.

Diana “Syd” Sydney sent her Patronus, in the form of a fox made out of silvery smoke, to find him. When Syd's spell spoke about what had happened. About news of the Whomping Willow.

Kane immediately Apparated to the outskirts of Hogwarts. He raced through the entire length of the Forbidden Forest, where its creatures and monsters recoiled from the aura of his emotions.

He hadn’t even realized that he was still wearing his gear. So, Kane quickly stashed them away.

The man had been furious at first. Angry at how reckless Bellamy had been. He not only endangered himself. He had endangered others. They could’ve all been killed. Kane wanted to yell at the top of his lungs. He wanted to scold and shout and grab the collar of the boy’s shirt and shake him senseless. He wanted to wake his ass up and snap him out of his headstrong thinking. Most of all, Marcus Kane wanted roar out how he would’ve felt if Bellamy had died.

Instead, Kane felt sick when he saw how Bellamy looked.

When he glared at the boy’s ravaged leg. At the burns that covered his face and his body. At the two massive bloody cuts that marked his forehead and his cheek. He felt cold and hot all over.

Kane wished he hadn’t killed that vampire and all those thralls so quickly. He wished he’d taken his time. Because he wanted to kill something again then and there. The man felt it in his bones.

But when Kane heard the circumstances behind the burning of the Whomping Willow. About Harper and the girls who terrorized her day in and day out. About his other two friends who’d gotten hurt alongside her. He calmed. If anything, the fact that Bellamy fought that hard for his people was magnificent. Marcus Kane had never felt prouder of the boy. He was brave. He proved that.

And he’d made friends. Which was what Kane worried most about after the boy first boarded the Express. When he left King’s Cross station, the man had regretted not giving Bellamy a hug.

Kane was never good at showing other people any affection. He didn’t really know how to do it.

Properly.

He hoped beyond hoping that the boy would find his place in the world and live in spite of his traumatic past. Of all the horrible things that had happened to him and his original family.

Bellamy did all of that and more. He didn’t just persevere, he’d flourished. He was a leader. And the two boys there, Roan and Nate, had followed after him without question. So, Marcus Kane allowed Bellamy Blake to fly over their camp on a broomstick they bought cheap. And the look of genuine joy on the boy’s tan face as he flew, whooping wildly as he did, was quite priceless.

“Hey.” The Gryffindor gently tugged Kane’s long-sleeved shirt. “Can I show you something?”

The man stopped moving. Bellamy had already started backing up in a whole other direction. He waited for the man’s go-ahead. Marcus Kane hesitated giving it. He didn’t know what to think.

“What is it?” Kane asked. He analyzed the look on Bellamy’s face and, surprisingly, couldn’t get a read off him: “Is everything alright?” This kind of thing had never happened before. Not once.

Bellamy nodded. He’d pointed his head backward towards a nearby ridge. “It’s over this way.”

“That’s not where our camp is.”

“I know. That’s not where we’re going.”

“Where are we going?”

“You’ll see.”

“What aren’t you saying?” The man asked. "What's there?”

“It’s hard to explain.” The boy replied: “I have to show you.”

“Huh?”

“Follow me.”

Bellamy got sick of waiting. Instead of waiting for a reply, he started to lightly trot in the direction he talked about earlier. Kane clenched his jaw, looking from left to right. The man grasped at his knife’s handle. And quickly followed after the boy.

Marcus hadn’t even given him the ‘okay’ yet. The man would have to relay that mistake over to Bellamy when this was all over. The boy was too bloody reckless for his own good. Both of them quickly moved. One after the other in a single conga-like line.

Through thickets and thickets of tall grass; they crossed over shrubs and various other plant life.

They pushed their way into long stalks of exotic-looking flora. Each more magical than the last.

“Here!” Bellamy called out: “We’re here!”

The pair of them wandered into a basin-like area ringed with walls of unevenly-shaped rocks. There looked to be a den in the middle of it that stretched farther back into a cave-like structure.

“What is this place?” Kane asked. His grip on the leather handle of his KA-BAR knife lessened.

But he didn’t completely release hold of his weapon.

“We have plenty of snark bellies back at camp.” The boy shook at the prey he’d hunted, the one tied around and hanging from his waist: “This isn’t for me.” Bellamy started moving forward.

“Then who’s it for?” The man questioned before re-tightening his hold on the hilt of his weapon. That’s when he heard a low, distant rumble emitting from the inside of that cave. “Bellamy, get back here!” Kane started marching forward towards Bellamy, intent on pushing him behind him.

The tan, freckled boy with hazel eyes and messy, black hair then whistled back into the cave. That was something Bellamy knew how to do well. He was skilled at sounding off sad ballads and looney-like tunes. Apparently, his mother had taught him how to do it. Before she had died.

Something responded deep from the dark depths. It was a whale-like, mournful call. Like it recognized something that was there and it had missed it so much. Then there was movement.

“Bellamy!” Kane warned. The boy moved away from him and went towards the shadowy den.

“It’s alright!” The Gryffindor raised both his arms. He shielded the entrance of the cave with his body in an attempt to dissuade the man from attacking. Kane made to grab him before stopping in his tracks. That was when he saw the thing in the cave. It raised all four hoofs on its way out.

“Here, Pegasus.” Bellamy softly crooned. He made a series of soothing sounds as he gently brought his hands down to brush against the bony, skeleton-like body of the creature. “It’s me.” It let out a neigh of satisfaction as it recognized the boy’s voice and his gentle touch. And then the magical beast flapped gusts of wind from its two wide, leathery wings: “Who’s a good boy?”

It was a Thestral.

“You are.” The boy cooed. “That’s who.” He kept petting the winged horse: “Yes you are, boy.”

The man let go of his combat knife entirely. This was a sight he hadn’t expected to see at all.

Marcus Kane watched as Bellamy Blake pressed his tan, freckled face against the beast’s reptilian face. “There you go.” The Gryffindor lightly scratched and smoothed the areas behind its ears and around its neck. “I’ve got something for you.” Bellamy laughed when the Thestral snorted into his messy, black hair. Then he untied the snark he hunted and brought it to its snout.

The magical creature sniffed at the recently killed pest and softy began nipping at its body. It refused to chomp it fully because Bellamy’s hands were in the way. Then the boy let go of it entirely so that Pegasus, the Thestral, gathered the dead parasite in its mouth and bit down hard.

Kane watched as Bellamy knelt down on the ground to fix a semi-bloody bandage wrapped around one of its legs. He re-tightened it while the Thestral crunched through the flesh and bone.

“I named him ‘Pegasus’.” Bellamy explained. "After Perseus’s winged horse.” He gently kissed the middle area of the Thestral’s snout. “He’s my friend.” The boy turned to Kane with a smile.

“He’s hurt.” Marcus managed to say out loud; it was the first and only noise he’d made in while. The man slowly approached the cave’s entrance where the Gryffindor tended to the creature.

“I know.” Bellamy replied. “But Gramps has been helping me take care of him.” The boy chuckled as the Thestral pressed its snout against both his face and hair. “He’s getting better.”

“Theo can see him too?” Kane was used to Bellamy calling Theo Azgeda by the nickname. After all, this location was his dominion. The old man was the one who tutored Bellamy alongside Nathan Miller and his grandson, Roan, after all three had been temporarily removed from Hogwarts. This was where all three boys spent their exile. Those four winter-filled months.

December, January, February, and March. After they had burned down the Whomping Willow.

Theo Azgeda was the one who kept on teaching them, though his lessons required a different sort of regimen. The grandfather believed a healthy mind needed a healthy body as well. He put all three boys through rigorous training. It was a punishment of sorts as well, for their rashness.

But the old man whipped all of the boys into physical shape. All three of them referred to him as ‘Gramps’ after that. Although he scared them all at first with his strict regime, they warmed up to him. Especially when Bellamy and Nate saw how he was with Roan. It was kind of a paradox.

Theo was rough and tough on them all, especially Roan. But behind that gruffness, that crochety ‘get off my lawn’ grandfather-esque persona, that old man irritability. There was the smallest of affections. Theo hid it well behind his tough guy act. But everyone knew. He was such a softie.

“He can.” Bellamy nodded. He’d wrapped both his arms around Pegasus’s neck. “And so, can you.” The Gryffindor boy looked pointedly at his guardian. “You obviously know he’s here.”

It was true. Marcus Kane had seen his fair share of death. Hell, most of the time he was the one dealing it to others. He dealt so much. The man had lost track of how many people he’d killed.

There were far, far, far too many. And Kane found that he no longer remembered their faces. Or the way their eyes looked when he stole all the light from them. The warmth. And he didn’t feel.

A goddamn thing for any of them; he used to be haunted by nightmares in the past. No longer.

If you did something long enough. And you did it well. You grew accustomed to it. Used to it.

Numb to it.

Time had a way of wringing out all the guilt and regret that plagues all our souls. It was a balm.

He filled his charter with red. But he wasn’t tortured by it. Not anymore. He had grown more than just 'numb'.

Kane had grown apathetic. 

But Bellamy...

“I can see him.” The boy said quietly. “I don’t know why.” He massaged Pegasus: “But I can.

...He’d seen it.

Kane observed as Bellamy gave the Thestral a hug. They looked comfortable with each other.

Like they’d done this before many, many times in the past. And Kane hadn't known about it.

Pegasus, pleased with all the affection and content with the meal, then limped back to the cave.

Only Kane and Bellamy remained standing in that ringed basin of a plateau in complete silence.

“The others can’t see him.” Bellamy whispered. Kane realized the boy referred to the rest of his friends. To Roan, Nate, and those two Ravenclaw boys of theirs. “Will you explain it to me?”

The Gryffindor turned to face his father with a determined look on his face. “I want to know why.” Bellamy clenched his gloved hands into fists and tucked them into the front of his hoodie.

“Didn’t Theo tell you-” Kane asked him in a low voice. “-the reason?” He should’ve known...

Bellamy shook his head. “Gramps told me to ask you: that you would give me the answer.”

Marcus Kane knelt down to Bellamy Blake’s level. He smoothed his right hand over the MTM Vulture tactical watch on his left wrist and then tightened both fists. Both of his brows furrowed.

The father didn’t know how to explain this to his son. Like with human contact, the man wasn’t that good with words either. He didn’t know how to connect with others. But for the boy. Kane forced himself to make an effort. Because Bellamy mattered. He delved deep inside of himself.

“Thestrals can only be seen...” The father chose his words carefully for his son: “...by those who’ve seen death.” Kane hated that Bellamy had to witness such a thing when he was young.

Bellamy widened his hazel eyes. And then he lowered them to the ground. The front of his messy, black hair covered the top of his head. The boy was quiet; he didn’t say a single word.

“You watched someone die in front of you-” Kane muttered: “-that’s the reason why, Bellamy.”

The boy quietly said to the man: “Oh.” He knuckled at his eyes with his gloved hands. “I see.”

Nobody spoke after that. The man knelt there and looked down as well. The boy just stood still.

If his eyes watered, he quickly wiped them away. Bellamy willed his tear ducts shut and refused to cry. No matter how much it hurt inside of himself; the boy always wanted to act tough, look tough.

Kane was the toughest person that Bellamy knew. And he wanted to emulate that trait most of all. The man never cried. At least, as far as the boy was concerned. Bellamy hardened his heart.

And swallowed all of the saliva in his mouth. He bit down hard on his lower, quivering lip. Which reminded him of Clarke. She would always do that, Bellamy noticed. And so did Harper.

“I’ve been having nightmares-” Bellamy quietly confessed. “-about the night that it happened.”

Marcus Kane’s mismatched eyes widened with shock at that revelation. He looked up at the boy.

“Not all the time.” The Gryffindor admitted in a low voice: “But they're bad.” Bellamy was thinking about a home that’d been his; thinking of a mother and a sister he once knew, once had.

“How bad?” Kane asked softly. He knew how it felt. To be thrown awake in the middle of the night by specters of the past. Covered in sweat and shaking like an autumn leaf. When he was an adult. After he’d done all of the terrible things he’d done. Bellamy’s were during his childhood.

“I can’t go back to sleep.” Bellamy whispered. The fractured and scrambled memory of losing both his mother and sister crept in and out of him while he slept. Sometimes he’d be free of them, others he wasn’t. They’d sink their claws in and haunt every thought he had of that night.

Kane gripped Bellamy’s shoulder with his left hand and squeezed; he felt his body shaking.

The boy’s visions were filled with voices, familiar and unknown, softly at first and then loudly all at once. Screaming. Shouting. Yelling. His mother shrieked: “Not her! Take me instead! You can have me! Not my baby girl!”

Then there was a flash of light. A spot where his mother used to be and then her all over the place. And Bellamy covered in liters of her blood. With bits of her flesh and hair and bone sticking to his skin and clothes and shoes.

Bellamy cried out in anguish, falling to his knees and breaking down. Shouting out his horror again and again and again and again. Louder and louder and louder. Even after the shadows left.

The boy still screamed.

He would wake up in a cold-sweat, tears in his hazel eyes. Cold, clammy, and shaking uncontrollably. As if he was naked in the midst of a blizzard on the mountains. Only he wasn’t.

The Gryffindor was inside his camping tent. Always alone. Always by himself. Always

“I’ll be too afraid to go back to sleep.” Bellamy told Kane in a low voice: “Which is stupid because I’m a Gryffindor and Gryffindors are supposed to be brave.” He’d sadly looked at him.

“That’s not stupid, Bellamy.” The man felt something grip the center of his chest: “It's not.”

The pressure was enough for his voice to sound tight, constricted. As if he was being strangled.

Bellamy would stay up for the rest of those nights, far away from his tent or camp and stare off into the night. The boy would look up towards the stars and moon and waited until night shifted into morning. Sometimes he’d get up and walk around outside, thinking about a mother he’d missed.

The Gryffindor would try his hardest to remember her because it was getting harder and harder to think about what she’d looked like without seeing her come up as an ugly red stain on the wall and floor.

His mother had a long face and hair black like his. Not as curly, mind you. But pressed and straightened. They shared the same hazel eyes. Her name was Aurora and whenever he did the laundry or washed the dishes, she’d call him her ‘little man.’ He liked being called that by her.

It made him feel grown up. Because he didn’t have a father back then. And it made him feel like he didn’t need one in order to be okay. Bellamy felt proud that he was taking care of them all.

She read him bedtime stories. Stories about gods and men. About heroes and monsters and villains. His favorite ones came from Greek Mythology. The legends he tried so hard to follow.

The woman who was his mother was beautiful. Inside and outside. And even though they didn’t have much in terms of wealth. They had each other. And that was enough for him. It really was.

There were so many times, when the boy thought maybe he should have died with her. Instead of being left alone in this world without her gentle, long hugs. He would never ever see her again.

And Octavia. The baby girl he helped deliver when his mother went into labor on the couch in their old, filthy flat. The one he named. After the sister of the Roman emperor, Augustus. His sister, his responsibility. His mother had charged him with loving her, with protecting her. Now he didn’t even know if Octavia was alive or dead or worse. His little sister.

He might never watch another Disney film with her again. Never poke fun at her favorite princesses. Never give her adventurous horseback rides around their small flat. Never distract her from the lack of lights and heat because their mother couldn’t afford to pay the bills on time, let alone provide them food on a regular basis. But when Aurora did, she’d make wonderful meals.

Like timballo.

His very favorite dish. Lasagna was a close second.

“They stole Octavia.” Bellamy sounded dead when he said that: “They took my sister from me.”

The boy had been holding onto this hope that if he could just remember. If he could just find out why Octavia had been taken, then maybe that would lead to who had taken his sister and where they were keeping her prisoner.

And then he’d tell Kane and all of the other Aurors in the underground bunker. Then they’d help him find her, rescue her, and bring her back to him.

But with every jarring flashback he had, that hope dwindled. Bit by bit. It was being drowned out by the noise. And the more disturbing they became, the less inclined he was to explore them all.

He didn't like hearing his mother begging for mercy or himself yelling: “Stop” over and over again. Or all the cursing, crashing, and footfalls that followed. Or his sister’s earsplitting scream.

His hope turned to dread and he began entertaining a bitter thought that left a sour aftertaste in his mouth: Octavia was dead. He’d failed to protect her. Failed at being her big brother. Failed.

Why had he been the only one left? They should’ve killed him too. Instead of leaving him behind.

At least then he would be spared from living a life without them. From the inevitable and unbearable truth: they would never see him grow up and he would never see them grow old.

Death would’ve been better.

“And they killed my Mom.” Bellamy whispered. There was bitterness in his voice and so much hatred. Not only towards the ones who did this to him. But towards himself. For not being strong enough to protect them both. The boy looked, felt depressed: “I wished they killed me instead.”

Kane felt as though someone stuck a dagger in his torso and dragged it all the way down towards the bottom of his abdomen so that all of his entrails fell out. He grabbed the collar of Bellamy’s hoodie and brought him close to his face: “Don’t you ever say that.” Kane said in a quiet, deadly voice. The boy had never seen the man look as angry as he did just now. At this very moment.

Bellamy refused to back down, to take it back. He stared at his father and defiantly repeated it.

Marcus Kane shook Bellamy Blake. “If you weren’t here-” The man hid pockets of his pain behind his angry face: “-where would that leave me?” The boy didn’t know the answer to that.

The ex-Auror closed his eyes and shook his head as if to dispel that kind of talk: “You’re my son, Bellamy.” Kane let go of the boy's collar and smoothed his hand through his messy, black hair: “And I’m your father.” The man ironed out all the wrinkles he made on Bellamy’s hoodie.

The Gryffindor felt ashamed. He wished he hadn’t said that to his father. He regretted saying it.

“I’m sorry, Dad.” Bellamy croaked: “It hurts.” The boy touched where his heart was. “Right here.” Then the Gryffindor curled his hand into a fist and pounded it there. “And-” Kane grabbed his wrist and prevented him from repeating such an action: “-I’m trying to keep it together.”

That was how Kane coined the mentality of not losing sight of yourself and not caving into pressure. He told Bellamy that was how you ‘always held onto the pieces that you’re made of.’

“I’m trying.” Bellamy felt his voice crack. He shut his eyes tight so nothing came out: “I really am.” The boy felt the man pull him close into a tight embrace. Kane had never done that before.

Not once. The man had never offered so much as a hug. Not after all this time. But now he did.

The man gripped the area beneath his ear, the same place where Bellamy had grabbed Roan before charging at the Whomping Willow, and pulled him close.

Bellamy’s hazel eyes widened. He wrapped his arms around the man and then hugged him back.

“I know you are.” Kane whispered: “There’s a reason why you’re in Gryffindor...” They held each other for a long while. Then the man had finished his sentence: “...you’re brave, Bellamy.”

“You were in Gryffindor too.” Bellamy mumbled: “Back when you went to Hogwarts. Right?”

“Right.” Marcus Kane nodded softly. “I was.”

“I’m broken.” Bellamy Blake said: “Aren’t I?”

“No, you’re not.” Marcus said fiercely. He took Bellamy by the cheeks and made him look at how serious he was about the matter: “You’re not.” The man shook his head: “You’ve just had bad things happen to you.” Marcus was the broken one, the damned. Not Bellamy: “That’s all.”

Bellamy experienced the worst kind of shit at too young of an age. But he hadn’t lost his way.

And Kane wanted to make it his whole life’s mission to keep it that way because the boy had good in him. He was brave and strong and good. The boy was all the things that the man wasn’t.

Kane realized that Bellamy reminded him of himself a long time ago; when the man was young.

“Octavia is alive.” Marcus Kane said with as much conviction as he could muster: “Believe in that.” He commanded: “We will find her.” The man swore to Bellamy Blake: “I promise you.”

“How?” Bellamy asked in a hushed tone. His hazel eyes were bright.

“I’m no longer bound.” Kane smiled: “I answer to no one but myself.”

“What does that mean?”

“It means I can investigate more freely now.”

“Really?” The Gryffindor boy asked. When the man nodded, he sighed deeply with such relief.

“I told you that I would help.” Marcus Kane had reminded Bellamy Blake: “This is me helping.”

“I’ll help too!” Bellamy declared, feeling like the very fires of life were rekindled inside him. “I don’t have to go back to Hogwarts.” His brows furrowed as he reasoned: “I’ll take a year off!”

“No.” Kane shook his head immediately at that: “I will search.” He placed his hand on Bellamy’s chest: “You are still recovering.” The man tapped at the boy’s temple: “Your mind needs time to heal. So, enjoy your life. Spend time with your friends. Learn. Be happy. Make mistakes. Live.”

“She’s my sister!” The boy protested. He didn’t like this one bit. “She’s my responsibility!”

“And you are mine, Bellamy.” Kane countered: “When your mind is whole again-” He gave the Gryffindor a serious look: “-you will remember more about that night.”

Bellamy opened his mouth to respond, but then closed it.

“You will remember-” The man continued: “-and you will tell me more details, more clues.”

“And then?”

“I’ll compare what you remember with what I will have found.”

“Will you take me with you?” The boy inquired: “When you find out where she is?”

“I’ll do you one better.” Kane grinned: “I’ll bring her back to you myself.”

“Won’t you need my help-” Bellamy frowned: “-to fight those people?”

“No.” Marcus Kane reassured him. “You just leave that part to me.”

“What will you do to them?” The expression on Bellamy Blake’s face looked visceral, violent.

Marcus didn’t like the way it looked on the boy’s face; he didn’t want that for him, not ever.

Besides.

Kane already had that part planned out in the darkest recesses of his mind: he would kill them all, of course. “I’ll put them in Azkaban.” The father then lied to his son: “Our magical prison.”

He was that guy.

“They deserve worse than that.” Bellamy said.

Kane replied: “And they’ll get it there.”

“The Dementor’s Kiss?”

“You’ve remembered our lessons well.”

“It’s a fate worse than death. Of course, I remember.”

“Let's head back.” Marcus nodded his head in the direction of their camp. “Come on, Bellamy.”

It was a silent trip back. Neither man nor boy said anything about the raw emotions displayed by the two of them in that bowl of a place. As they both started walking back towards where the others were, Bellamy tucked his hand into Kane’s. “Thank you.” He said this ever so quietly.

Marcus didn’t look down at the Gryffindor boy. He stared straight ahead and then smiled softly to himself. And for the first time. In a very, very, very long time. Marcus Kane felt truly at peace.

Hell, he even felt as if he liked himself again. “Thank you.” Kane emphasized the ‘you’ in his reply. “For what?” Bellamy posed the question back, feeling confused. He hadn’t done anything.

But he had. More than he would ever know. For Marcus Kane had thanked Bellamy Blake for coming across his path. At a time when the man felt like he didn’t deserve anything good in his life. Because the Ministry of Magic’s most devastating warrior, a man who not only accomplished countless strike missions and wet work operations but survived them all when so many others hadn't, didn't feel like he’d needed anything. Until he met this boy.

And when that happened, the one-man-army felt less like a weapon and more like a person.

A real human being.

“For being you.” Kane responded. He squeezed right back before letting go of Bellamy’s hand.

And the pair of them left it at that.

By the time Marcus Kane and Bellamy Blake made it back to camp, everyone had already woken up and were sitting around the roaring firepit at the center of all their tents. The smell of coffee and sizzling, thick, fat slices of meat pervaded the air. The people there noticed the two’s return.

“I CAN’T BELIEVE THIS!” Roan Azgeda, trying his best to mimic Bellamy’s mannerisms, sprinted towards his best friend at full speed. The long-haired boy, finally blessed with a good home, slid near the messy, black-haired boy, and pouted: “You went hunting without me?!”

“You go hunting with Gramps all the time.” Nathan Miller said through a mouthful of fried tomatoes, sausage, and crispy bacon. “We saved some for you, Bellamy.” He’d raised a plate.

David Miller gave them both a friendly wave while he continued stirring the inside of their frying pan. Hannah Green beamed at them before adding more ingredients into all of the cooking.

“Bellamy’s back!” Monty Green excitedly shouted from inside his tent. “Gerroff!” The sounds of the Ravenclaw boy struggling with his tent-mate ensued. Before the Asian boy tumbled outside.

Jasper Jordan tripped over his friend and fell as well. The two Ravenclaw boys made quite a sight, tangled up in a crumpled heap dressed in their pajamas. “Hi, Bellamy.” Jasper responded.

“They’ve been waiting to tell you all morning.” Roan explained, gesturing at the fallen boys.

Nate chewed his food thoughtfully, inside his mouth, before swallowing: “They’ve got a plan.”

Roan finished: “For when we go into town.”

“They say it’s ‘fool-proof.’” Nate air-quoted.

“It is!” Jasper protested. He struggled his way back up. “Bellamy, you’ve got to believe us!”

“Our percentages of success-” Monty calculated with his fingers: “-increase by the minute!”

Kane stared at both Ravenclaw boys before looking towards Bellamy, expecting an explanation.

“It’s a surprise-” Bellamy then shrugged at his guardian with both hands: “-for the McIntyre's.”

“Don’t bother prying it out of them.” A pebbly voice voiced out from behind them. “It’ll give you a migraine.” Old-timer Theo Azgeda appeared from the woods as well. Belts upon belts of slaughtered snarks hung from his shoulders and across his chest like bandoliers of ammunition.

“Why didn’t you wake me?” Roan trotted to where his grandfather came from: “I could’ve helped.” Theo’s salt and pepper-colored hair was tied in a manbun. Roan’s mahogany hair was also tied in a short ponytail as well. He was trying his best to emulate the old man. Both Azgedas learned from each other.

Theo Azgeda wasn’t like the rest of his clan. Not only had he been estranged from the rest of them, he'd been missing for years. Many thought the patriarch dead or in exile forever. But the grandfather reappeared at the turn of the tide, to take in Roan and watch over him when he was disowned. Even by his own mother, Queen Nia, who saw fit to replace him as heir to the Azgeda line with Echo. The elderly man was...more world-weary. Every time he stroked his salt and pepper-colored beard, he’d looked wiser beyond his years, which seemed impossible. The man was already old. Any older and he'd be dead.

Nonetheless, Theo Azgeda appeared more level-headed. More traveled. More tolerant. And he acted as much. From a distance, one couldn’t tell that he’d been a Slytherin. “Didn’t want to wake you.” Theo’s words sounded like a driveway rather than a voice. “Did you have breakfast?” Roan’s eyes went to the dirt as he moved from foot to foot.

“You can eat while you’re waiting for your friend.” Theo gruffly scolded.

Roan looked up at his grandfather and said: “I wasn’t waiting for Bellamy.”

The pair of them stared each other down. Before Theo wordlessly handed over all of his belts of dead snarks. Roan grunted as he carried them back to camp. The old man had on his signature leather jacket, the one lined with wolf fur, cargo pants and hiking boots. He looked over Bellamy and Kane with his pale eyes. Theo Azgeda circled the two of them like a desert vulture.

And then he turned to Bellamy.

“Have you tried talking to him about tying his hair back?” Theo asked. “Just like mine?”

Bellamy laughed at him: “Not yet.” He pointed at Kane’s head: “I think he likes it long.”

“I can hear you.” Kane didn’t look amused at the jape.

“Tell your old man that the manbun cures all ailments.” The grandfather pointed at his own hair.

Bellamy nodded and turned to Kane. “Dad.” He pointed at Theo: “Gramps wants me to tell you-”

“I heard him, Bellamy.” The man gritted his teeth and pointed at Theo: “Listen here you-”

The old-timer quickly moved away and circled around him back to Bellamy.

Theo quickly joked: “Did he stomp around and make a big ruckus?” He jerked a thumb at Kane.

“No!” Bellamy protested: “He helped me with my shot! We were as silent as the harvest moon!”

"Damn it.” Marcus growled at and went after the grandfather. “Watch it old man, I’ll-”

“Is that so?” The old man retreated and evaded Kane, pretending not to hear him.

“It is. Guess what?” The tan-skinned, freckled boy didn't notice Kane alternating looks between them. Kane couldn’t believe what he was seeing: the pair of them were playfully conspiring.

“What?” The grandfather then asked.

“I killed a snark!” The boy answered.

“You did?” Theo smiled. When Bellamy excitedly nodded, the old man nodded back with approval. "That’s the way.” He’d looked at the boy’s person, checking all over. “Where is it?”

“I gave it to Pegasus.”

“Ah, I see.” Theo looked to Kane: “So you told him.”

When Marcus Kane realized that the old man was no longer joking, he nodded back quietly.

And that was it. That was the end of all the mockery between the grandfather and the father.

He always poked fun at the ex-Auror. When Bellamy asked Nate’s father, David, why Theo always traded barbs with Kane. The officer of Magical Law Enforcement Patrol said he was ‘breaking his balls’, whatever that meant. It wasn’t mean or nasty, it wasn’t even ill-natured; quite the contrary.

Theo respected Kane a great deal.

He just liked getting on his nerves, getting a rise out of him. Theo thought Kane was ‘too serious.’ And he said as much.

So, the old man worked on lightening him up. Which was ironic because the older man was acting like a younger man and the younger man had the steely, serious nature of a seasoned senior citizen.

The grandfather laughed aloud. It sounded like a great, deep, loud rumble of a thing. Theo pointed at Kane’s serious-looking face and chuckled: “Careful, lassie.” Bellamy always thought Roan’s grandpa sounded like a lively, witty, Scotsman. “Your face might get stuck that way.”

“I’m right here.” Marcus murmured as if to say ‘we talked about this.’: “Quit talking over me.”

“Aye, aye, aye Suzy.” Theo chuckled and then saluted, before knuckle-tapping Kane’s chest. “Come on.” The grandfather jerked his head as if to say ‘we need to talk’. “I need your help.”

“With what?” Kane looked concerned. “What is it?”

“I’ve got to talk to the forest.” Theo told Kane: “Feels like a two-man job.”

“Trouble?”

“I don’t know yet.” The grandfather shrugged. “But I could use someone watching my back.”

“You’ve got it.” Kane answered Theo. And that was their relationship. Poking fun at each other.

But when the situation called for it: back to business. Powerful playmakers on the same team.

Because when it concerned the harmony of their camp, the safety of both their families. Of Roan and Bellamy. Both the father and the grandfather prepared for war. 

The Azgeda patriarch nodded at the ex-Auror, turned to the boys, to Roan, Nate, Bellamy, and called: “Don’t forget your mission!” He was referring to their trip into town. “The meat there!”

All three looked to the woodened pole where the belts of dead snarks now hung. They nodded.

Kane looked to Bellamy, gripped the boy’s shoulder with his right hand, squeezed, and then moved to follow the grandfather. They went off to the side to talk about their task some more.

Bellamy felt something press into the side of his arm.

“Here you go, mate.” Roan whispered to his best friend. He gave Bellamy the breakfast-filled plate they’d prepared upon his return. The mahogany-haired Azgeda munched on his own food.

“Thank you.” Bellamy took the plate and smiled at his friend. “Smells good.” The boy took a seat on one of the logs that Theo Azgeda had fashioned into a bench. “So, what’s this plan?”

“It takes a while to explain.” Nate chimed in as he joined his two friends: “Monty. Jasper. Go.”

Jasper plopped down next to the Broken Lion Boys. The idols who the pranksters strived to be.

“So, it goes like this-” Monty joined his partner in crime: “-we’ve got some lychees.”

“A whole bag of them-” Jasper bragged with such arrogance: “-ripe for the bartering.”

Bellamy smiled as he listened in. When he first met these two Ravenclaws, he couldn’t imagine they’re being two huge fans as a result of he and his friends’ trouble-making. But they were and they wanted to be friends with all three of them. All three boys were more than happy to oblige.

The messy, black-haired boy looked around the camp, at all the people there: his friends and their families. And Kane in the distance talking with Gramps. And he knew he still had a family.

Because they were it. This was his home. And it was only going to get bigger.

Bellamy knew that now. And he felt at peace.


End file.
